Faculty Voices with Jackie Briggs Martin: Side by Side

Betty Comden and Adolph Green
New York Times photo/SuzanneDeChillo

Every working day for more than sixty years, Betty Comden and Adolph Green sat down together to write song lyrics-- for composers such as Leonard Bernstein (once their accompanist) and André Previn. We all know their songs—“Make Someone Happy,” “Just in Time,” “The Party’s Over,” “New York, New York.” 

Audiences loved them.  In 1958 Brooks Atkinson, theater critic for the New York Times,  called them “good enough for just about any civilized corner of the world.”  According Comden’s obituary in the Times,  (November 24, 2006), “They met daily, most often in Ms. Comden’s living room, either to work on a show, to trade ideas or even just talk about the weather.” Theirs was a life-long collaboration.

And that’s really what I want to consider: collaboration. Comden and Green wrote song lyrics. We write stories, books. It’s all words.  How does it go when we work with words with others?  Ms. Comden said of their collaboration: “We don’t divide the work up. We develop a mental radar, bounce lines off each other.” (New York Times; October 25, 2002).

I expect each instance of collaboration is different. But perhaps they all involve some kind of “mental radar,” and the joy of sharing ideas, "bouncing lines."

 

Ron Koertge and Christine Heppermann have been collaborating on a series of early chapter books—Backyard Witch (Greenwillow; July, 2015). Ron says of their work, “It always strikes me in collaboration that somebody has to drive the car and somebody has to/wants to ride shotgun.  Chris drove our car.  She’s much more focused in general than I am, so I could just  — I’m going to wring everything out of this car-metaphor that I can  — look out at the cornfield.”

But, in spite of the useful car metaphor, the writing gets passed back and forth. And there's some shared understanding of what the final story should look like—mental radar.  

Christine said, "[Ron] is probably right that I had the more definite vision, at least in the beginning, for who the characters were and where I wanted the story to go. But as we got deeper into the process, I think we became equally invested, to the point where now, when I go back to the finished text, I can't always remember who wrote what. We're both pretty meticulous about word choice--Poets!--so each sentence has a little of each of us in it, I'd bet. I love the two-minds-as-one aspect of collaboration." 

As a picture book writer I’ve always felt that a picture book is a collaboration of many minds—writer, artist, editor, book designer. And I’ve thought my books were better for the multiple perspectives. But it wasn’t until my daughter moved to California and gave birth to our first grandchild that I wanted to collaborate on the actual text. 

Here was this grandchild in California. Here was I in Iowa.  Insert powerful need to see grandchild.  Insert missing a daughter.  And the result is a story about a granny who walks to California to see her grandbaby, a story that Sarah and I worked on together.  She had the new infant so maybe I was the one who drove the car. I’d write a draft and she’d fix it—whenever she had time.  We both agreed on what we wanted the story to be.  The work was fun and we did it for each other.  Of course we wanted to publish, but we also wrote to amuse each other. Whoever else might see it was a little further from my mind than when I work alone. (And, we are now in the middle of another tale.)

I’ve  recently been working on a non-fiction piece with Phyllis Root and Liza Ketchum. In this instance there were three distinct parts of the story. And we divided the responsibility for the research.  We each wrote up what we had learned. Then we got our hands into the clay, combined the three parts and worked together to smooth out the seams.  Again, though we all believed the story was important and wanted it to get out to the wider world, we wrote to please each other.  And we had a wonderful time, so much fun that we are looking around for another project.

Think about writing a piece with someone else, someone who shares your passion for a story, someone you love to work with.  You don’t have to be like Betty Comden and Adolph Green, who only worked together. “Alone, nothing,” Mr. Green once said. “Together a household word…”  Working with someone can be just part of your writing portfolio. My daughter is a poet who is continuing to publish books and chapbooks. Phyllis, Liza, and I have individual writing projects. Both Christine and Ron are continuing to publish their own work, as they collaborate.  Working with someone can be just one of your writing projects—a treat for you and a writer friend.

Faculty Voices with Phyllis Root

Phyllis, second from left.
Click to enlarge.

In the past few weeks two events have converged. I bought yet another book on getting rid of clutter, and I had my sixty-sixth birthday. I don’t have sixty-six years of things to sort through, but I am finding bits and pieces of my life I had squirreled away and completely forgotten about.

Take this photo of a friend’s wedding in which I was a bridesmaid. I almost didn’t recognize myself in a long pink dress with long hair and a wreath of flowers, and I had to rummage in my memory to recall the bride’s name.

And these grade school pictures: here I am in sixth grade, fifth grade, fourth grade. In Talent is Not Enough Molly Hunter wrote about seeing a picture of her young self and thinking, “Warn her! Oh, for God’s sake, why did nobody warn her?”

Looking at these younger selves, I wonder what I’d say if I could send a message back in time. I had already lost my mother, so I knew about the uncertainty of the universe and the black hole of loss. Would I warn my ten-year-old self of more deaths ahead? Of the dark despair of depression? Would I tell her to find a good-paying profession with benefits and a pension plan? Would I whisper a few words that would allow her to develop the Internet or back a spectacularly winning horse?

I could tell her, “You will fall in love and out of love. You will have babies who grow up to be self-sufficient young women. You will have friends of the heart to see you through tough times and good times.”

And if my younger self pressed me for more, I might say, “You’ll go to South Africa and Vanuatu, you’ll raft down the Zambezi river and dogsled in 20 below weather and stand on the rim of an active volcano, you’ll sail and canoe and kayak and grow vegetables and wildflowers and hear whales breathing around you in the darkness.”

But mostly I think I’d tell her, “You will be very lucky, because you will live among words. Words to tell your daughters that they are strong and beautiful and can do anything they put their minds and hearts to. Words to write books that, amazingly, other people might read. Words with which to try to give a voice to the world you will inhabit.”

Most of what I’m finding now in basements and closets I’ll let go. The pages of old stories can be recycled into new paper for new stories that someone, somewhere, will write. The clothes in the back of my closer will keep other folks warm. The books I’ve read and loved will be read and loved by someone else. But I’ll keep those pictures somewhere where I can see them once in awhile, and when I look at them, I will tell those younger selves (and the self I am now), “Darlin’, you’re going to be all right.”

Faculty Voices with Marsha Qualey: A Do-Over

MarshaQ

I don’t believe I’ve ever finished a presentation or lecture without immediately wanting a do-over, a chance to add something or approach things from a slightly different angle.

Things were no different this past residency when I presented on “Conflict.” As it happened, I did get one chance for a do-over because my presentation and another were scheduled concurrently and we repeated them so students could attend both. I was grateful for the chance to revise and reorganize between the first session and the rerun.

But not even ten minutes after the second presentation had concluded I wanted to corral all the students back into the lecture hall. "More, there’s one thing more! I forgot something!"

And I have Phyllis Root to thank for that.

In the final moments of my allotted time that second time around she asked the question that I should have anticipated and the answer to which should be part of any lecturer’s talk: “Can you give an example from your own work?”

I was gobsmacked. I hadn’t included an example, and in the rush of adrenaline that accompanies fifty minutes of jabbering in front of an audience, I couldn’t think of one on the spot.

Ten minutes later when everyone was gone from the room and the rush was subsiding, I of course came up with an answer, but it was one that made me realize, “Oh, wow, I forgot to talk about that.”

So now I am indulging in a do-over on the Inkpot. First, a recap of the topic and lecture.

I was speaking on “Conflict.” Early into the talk I reminded those present of one of the many gems from Laura Ruby’s first-day lecture on world-building: Within the rules of the fictional world are the seeds of conflict.

I then suggested to those present in the lecture hall to consider that there are also worlds within worlds, and each has its own set of rules.

Identify all of the worlds your character lives in and navigates between, I advised. In a realistic novel, for example, these worlds might be labeled, “Family” or “School” or “Job.” There might even be—should be—smaller worlds within those worlds. “Cousins” or “high school band” or “night shift.” Each will have its own rules. Identify the rules. (Never talk about the uncle who drinks; never flirt with anyone in the clarinet section; never give free ice cream cones to people you know.)

Then I once again brought up a favorite craft theory of mine: Power + Belonging = Identity. Our stories are essentially about identity, the realization of an individual on the page. If conflict is what makes a story soar (and heaven knows the writing experts tell us just that) than one should look to create conflict in the worlds where a character’s power and sense of belonging are the most vulnerable or the most secure. Those places are the sweet spot of conflict. Use them.

What I didn’t say and will now is …Those spots are also the places where the conflict you create MUST resonate. Get that? I used all caps, so I hope so.

Even if the important action happened elsewhere in the main character’s life and not in the places where he/she/zhe feels most or least powerful or at home, the impact must be felt in all those places. If not, your conflict is cheap stuff.

And Phyllis Root, my dear friend and esteemed colleague, I have an example from my own work.

As Just Like That begins, Hanna Martin, the main character, dumps a boyfriend and (now in a churlish mood) takes a late night walk to a nearby lake. The mood is made worse by the high spirits of a couple that is riding around—illegally—on a four wheeler, so she doesn’t tell them that the ice is thin on the lake. The next morning she learns they went out on the ice and broke through; both have died. She, not surprisingly, feels enormous guilt.

Hanna is a talented artist and she also has a very loving relationship with her mother and two best friends (power and belonging, yes?) While her art and the relationships have nothing to do with the inciting incident, you can bet I turned to those parts of her life to demonstrate the impact of the accident and the devastating power of her guilt.   

So this is my lecture addendum in a nutshell: Yes, the worlds where a character’s power(s) and sense of belonging are the weakest or strongest will indeed provide the sweet spots for detonating conflict, but they are equally important as barometers of that conflict.

My do-over is done.

Meet the Grad: Randall Bonser

On January 18, 2015, on the final day of the upcoming residency, the MFAC program will have a Graduate Recognition ceremony, honoring the men and women who have just completed their studies and will receive an MFA from Hamline University. Between now and residency we'll be posting interviews with many of the grads. Randall Bonser is today's grad; he lives in in the metro Atlanta, GA area. To learn more about his writing, please visit his website or follow him on Twitter: @rbwritenow

Randall with one of his ghost projects.

What do you do when you’re not working on packets?

I taxi young teenagers (mine, not others’) to school activities and sports. I wash the uniforms of said young teenagers. I play in a men’s soccer league. I defy house rules and buy more children’s books.

How did you hear about the Hamline MFAC Program?

I was stalking Ron Koertge, whose books I love, and was trying to find out if he taught anywhere. Lo and behold he taught at this college in St. Paul. The low residency nature sounded good, and I’d get to rub shoulders with Ron, so I investigated. I went to an investigative meeting in Chicago and met Christine Heppermann, who is my new literary hero (sorry, Ron).

What was your writing experience prior to entering the program?

I have made my living as a writer for many years in advertising, marketing, business-to-business, and ghost writing. I also wrote poetry and stories for fun, but now I’m trying to make those fun projects my serious projects.

What do especially remember about your first residency?

Everyone had the flu. And the workshop was awesome, I learned a ton. And I met Claire Rudolf Murphy, who got me excited about the semester’s work. Oh, and I met this group of people who called themselves the Hamsters, my class, and enjoyed getting to know them. Evenings at the hotel were great bonding times, and lots of fun.

Have you focused on any one form (PB, novel, nonfiction; graphic novel) or age group in your writing? Tried a form you never thought you’d try?

I don’t know if it’s a good idea, but I tried a little of everything – nonfiction, YA, poetry, picture books, graphic novel. I’ve had a blast, and learned a ton. I’m hoping that the broad range will help me, but I’m a little nervous that I didn’t concentrate on one form. I love them all and want to write them all, but I’m not sure that’s realistic.

Tell us about your Creative Thesis.

I completed a first draft of a graphic novel called “Rocket Captain.” It’s about a boy and girl in 7^th grade who struggle to find success in a culture that defines them before they get a chance to define themselves. The girl is Vietnamese American, the boy is African American. The two are called upon to help build a rocket in science class. They start as friends, have a misunderstanding and start working against each other, then try to find a way to reconcile at the end. Working with Gene Yang was great because he is very smart about STORY. When my story was not holding up, or I took a short cut, or was not supporting a plot twist, he let me know. I enjoy the graphic novel medium and hope to keep working in it.

What changes have you seen in your writing during your studies?

I am much more aware of story elements. I used to think that good stories were organic, that they didn’t follow a formula. But when I looked at the stories I liked, they had elements in common. They weren’t artificial, but they were carefully planned and fine-tuned. I hope that awareness of story is more present in my work than it used to be.

With packet deadlines removed as an incentive, do you anticipate it will be harder to keep writing? Any plans for your post-Hamline writing life?

I have been trying to establish a schedule that will work for me once the deadlines are no longer there. Phyllis Root helped me when I worked with her to establish daily routines that start the night before so that you have a sense of accomplishment, even when you only write a little bit. I plan to pursue some of the projects I’ve started here at Hamline and see if I can work toward publication, no matter what I am doing “for a living.”

Any thoughts for entering students or for people considering the program?

This is a very enjoyable program and you get to dabble in things you wouldn’t normally get to work in. The feedback is fantastic. For serious writers, you’re going to get to the point when you say, “I love my critique group, but how can I get some professional feedback on what I’m writing?” You can hire an editor or coach, or you can enroll in a program like Hamline. I’ve had the time of my life.

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The public is welcome to attend the graduate recognition ceremony on Sunday, January 18, 3:30pm, (Anne Simley Theatre, Drew Fine Arts Building). Linda Sue Park is the speaker.

Faculty Voices with Phyllis Root

Phyllis Root

I love words.

Well, of course, you say.  You call yourself a writer.  Of course you love words. But I love them even outside the context of stories or articles or poems. I love the sound of them.  The taste of them.  The shape of them.  I love words and phrases and whole sentences and paragraphs. Give me a good, meaty word to chew on and I’m happy.

I collect words in the same way I love picking up those little bits of frosted beach glass or finding an agate that catches the slanted sunlight.

Here are a few words and phrases that have caught my eye and ear over time.

In The Sailor’s Word Book I found bran, which meant to lie under a floe edge, in foggy weather, in a boat in Arctic seas, to watch the approach of whales.  (Could you think of anything more lovely, all contained in four letters?)

From research into Lake Superior in an old journal I found this description “a little dumpling of a schooner.”

From hearing a former railroad worker talk, I learned gandy dancer, a term for an early railroad worker who laid and repaired tracks. 

From hearing the TV weather report about a torrential rain in Fort Wayne, Indiana:  “It’s a real frog choker out there.”
And one of my all-time favorites, from a talk on geology about which I understood almost nothing but loved the sound of this: pelecypod-bearing wacke.

Will I ever use these words?  Maybe not. Some are archaic, some regional, some scientific. But just the act of collecting them feels like a way to tune my ear to the sound of language, which is at the root of what we writers do.  We manipulate sound and meaning.  Why not collect words in the same way an artist makes sketches or a composer gathers musical phrases?

And who knows?  Maybe I will find a way to use them, although most likely not all in a single sentence.  Unless, or course, I have the chance to turn down a job as a gandy dancer, board a little dumpling of a schooner moored to some pelecypod-bearing wacke, and sail off in a real frog-choker to bran. 

Hmmm, maybe there’s a story there after all.

Alumni Voices with Polly McCann: The Writing Process: or Why I Love Being a Failure

On the highest shelf of a storage closet, in the furthest part of my basement, behind a room someone painted purple—for reasons known only to them—are three boxes. I’ve never opened them. What’s in them? A photography darkroom kit I would have done anything for twenty years ago. Now they are just dreams put on a shelf.

I wanted to be a famous artist, like Modigliani or Picasso, or Mary Engelbreit. I envisioned art installations at galleries with photo emulsion-washed linen—fifteen feet high. Anyway, I’ve never done an installation, not one. And my gallery sales to date: two paintings. I could say I’m a failure at becoming a famous artist. But then, there’s something about the writing life that flourishes in failures. 

So to all your storytellers out there who constantly dip your pen into that inkwell (and don’t always feel like the Olympic-sized winner you really are) I wanted to explain why I love being a failure. Possibly, you have a similar list with vague intentions to use those castoff failures somewhere or other: There was the time I failed at being a banker, but I know that that bank vault scene in my middle grade novel is truly accurate. Or what about the time I failed at being a secretary, a janitor, a nanny, or a preschool teacher? they could be professions for my characters’ parents. Then there were those failed friendships, a marriage, ten consecutive summer gardens, the time I tried to sew pants. Okay, so maybe all of you haven’t failed at as many things as I have. But you might be thinking that life is fodder for art, or writing, or something like that. Right?

Sure, maybe the missteps we own are the crap we shovel into the compost heap called the writing life. Well, I think there is more to it than that. Our failures form not just what we write, but how we write. Something about our writing process changes from experience. The kind of failure that I’m talking about are the kind in which you mastered something; truly loved something only you put it away in order to write. We all have these failures hiding on a shelf in our closet, but you know what I love about being a failure? Failing to become that museum quality artist is exactly what made me into the writer I am today.

Let me describe my process. Here I am writing my first novel, or third (or at least the one I promise not to throw away this time). I feel totally confident from all my Master’s level classes: I’ve got Plot from Marsha Qualey; Point of View from Phyllis Root and Jackie Briggs Martin (I can still hear them talking about ducks “Oh, no, mud!” they are saying in very duck-like voices); I have endowed objects, and talismanic words in my dialogue just like Ron Koertge said I should; I have Eleanora’s third leg of the three legged stool—Setting; and I have asked myself WWJRTD? What would Jane Resh Thomas do to find out what my character truly desires; and I’ve even tried to build a world which follows find Anne’s heroic monomythic journey. I’m left alone to face something worse than the blank page, reams of really bad free writing. That’s when the beauty starts.

Now that I’ve built a framework out of the best advice anywhere (Thank you Hamline MFAC!) but my poor novel still resembles a scared rabbit in the headlights, my failures kick in. Suddenly I know what to do: Ah, now it’s time to sketch in the layout. Now it’s time to add contrast and color to my characters. Now it is time to paint the scene. My writing process takes on new terminology unique to my own experiences and failings. I know that because I’ve learned how to do one thing well, I can learn another. That includes writing a novel, or maybe a graphic novel, or a play. So in fact, my past failures weren’t really failures, they were just the beginning. My failure was really the foundation of everything. It’s what I write and more importantly it’s how I write.

One of my favorite authors, E.L. Konigsburg sums up the process of calligraphy writing in her novel, The View from Saturday, and I think loving our failures as storytellers works pretty much the same way:

            "You must think of those six steps not as preparation for the beginning but as the beginning itself."

       

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Polly McCann is a 2011 graduate of the Hamline MFAC program. To learn more about her writing and illustrating, please visit her website.

Faculty Voices with Phyllis Root

Phyllis Root

A few weeks ago in early October I drove 80 miles through the dark and rain and road construction and buffeting winds to sign books at a conference.  I made it to the conference.  My books didn’t.

Turns out two numbers in the zip code of the address of the conference had been transposed, so UPS hadn’t managed to deliver the books in time for the morning signing. 

I’d heard this horror story from other writers, of having no books at a supposed signing, but this was the first time it had happened to me.  I have my own horror stories of signings, of getting the date wrong and missing a signing, of signings where no one shows up to buy a book, of sitting next to an author whose has long lines of folks buying multiple copies of his book while I contemplate taking up knitting. You never know what a signing will bring, but you show up and hope your books do as well.

I was assured that the books should arrive momentarily.  They didn’t make it by the time I had to leave to drive the eighty miles back home, but I spent the hour saying hey to authors I hadn’t seen for months and chatting with my table mate whose books were in the same UPS shipment.  We covered everything from stop action animation to bungee jumping, rappelling, and white water rafting, scary and not so scary movies.  I even managed to photo-bomb a picture. 

I vowed to always bring some of my own books with me from now on to signings and drove home past trees just beginning to turn, listening to weather reports of snow before morning. Minnesotans know that when it comes to weather, anything is possible.

Writers know this, too.  We dwell in possibility, both good and bad. That email you just opened or that phone you just answered could be the news that a book is out of print or an offer to turn your story into a play.

That knock on the door?

It might be opportunity.

Or it might just be the UPS driver with a box of books sent to the wrong zip code.

Publication Interview with Jamie A. Swenson: If You Were a Dog

FSG/Macmillan, Sept. 30, 2014
illustrated by Chris Raschka

Please describe the book.

From the flap: “With joyful, impressionistic illustrations for Caldecott Medal-winning illustrator Chris Raschka and spare, rhythmic text that invites playful interaction, If You Were a Dog is the perfect read-aloud for your favorite little animal.”

As the story progressed from inception to copy-edited version, what were the major changes?
When I first started writing this book – I was all over the board in terms of what the kids might imagine being. A dog? A cat? A cloud? A paintbrush? Eventually, I revised and settled on using only animals. The other main difference between the first drafts and the final version is the ending – which was non-existent for years. Originally, the book was just a bunch of seemingly non-connected, yet fun and poetic questions.

How did those changes come about?
I focused on using only animals after one of my critique group members (a nonfiction writer) mentioned that some of the scenarios were animate and some were inanimate objects and it bothered her! It hadn’t bothered me until that moment – but then I clearly saw how I was not focused in the manuscript. The ending came about after Phyllis Root suggested that an ending that tied everything together might be a good thing. The moment she suggested I do this, it became clear to me what was missing and I added the final piece of the puzzle!

As far as copy-edited version changes – the only change made from the original purchased text to the finished text was one sentence. The original sentence read, “But you are not a dog, or a cat, or a fish, or a bird, or a bug, or a frog, or a dinosaur or anything of the sort … you are a kid who can …” My editor took out the words “you are a kid who can” and suggested simply “… you can…” which is fine, it has the same meaning, but in truth, I still like my version better! hee hee hee …

The one thing I am surprised that didn’t change are all the hyphens. I used a lot of them because I love them so. I thought they would be the first thing to go. “If you were a dog, would you be a speedy-quick, lickety-sloppidy, scavange-the-garbage, frisbee-catching, hot-dog-stealing, pillow-hogging, best-friend-ever sort of dog?” See. Lots of hyphens. In this case, they are necessary modifiers. I will, however, concede that in most cases I overuse them. Sorry. I am working on that issue. My critique group had FITS over this manuscript and kept arguing whether I was using the hyphens correctly or not. Eventually, I decided to just let the future editor decide and kept the hyphens they way I wanted them.

When did you first begin work on it? When did you finish?
This book was one that initially flowed out of me in the course of a few days – but then took a few years to figure out why it wasn’t working. The book sold in Dec. 2009 – my first sale! And will be out in Sept. 2014. That was a long, yet worthwhile, wait.

What research was involved before and while writing the book?

I actually did do a lot of research when writing this book – I wanted to know what dogs, cats, fish, birds, bugs, frogs, and dinosaurs really did before playing with how I described each one. I find it helpful to read nonfiction articles about the animals I’m using in my picture books because I often stumble upon a word, a description, an action, or a sound that I might not have thought about if I was just relying on my own brain to think it up.

Boom! Boom! Boom! , your first book, was published in 2013. What have you learned about the business of writing since then?

That it doesn’t get any easier once one book, two books, or three books are in the world. Each book is its own challenge and the writer needs to focus on the work at hand – not the books that are already out. It’s easy to get distracted from the work-in-progress while trying to support the books that are out there – there needs to be a balance between creative writing time and marketing support time. Also, one writer can only do so much to support any book – the rest is up to the publisher and the world.

Where do you do most of your writing?

I write at my kitchen table and in my head as I walk my dogs.

Do you remember the first book you loved?

The first book I truly loved was Katie John by Mary Calhoun. It was an early chapter book; I bought it from the school book fair. I read that book about a hundred times when I was in second and third grade. I wish I still had a copy of it so I could read it again, but, alas, it was lost at some point as I grew into longer books such as Anne of Green Gables. (I just Googled Katie John and see that it’s available online – hooray for the internet!)

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Jamie A. Swenson is a July 2009 graduate of the Hamline MFAC program. She lives and writes in Janesville, Wisconsin. To learn more about Jamie and her writing, please visit her website.