Thursday, August 15, 2013

Find No Ceiling



As a writer, you should try everything. Whatever it takes to get the words on the page. Write at home. Write in the office. Write in coffee shops. Write lying down. Write standing up. Write commuting. Write with music. Write in silence. Draw up outlines. Burn them up! Believe in magic. Believe in science. Research. Make things up. Swear. Find high ceilings. Find no ceiling. Face the window. Face the wall. Mismatch your socks. The [piece of writing] you start with may not be the [piece of writing] you end up with. And that's fine. That's ideal, in fact.

--Bill Cheng, author of Southern Cross The Dog, as quoted in July/August 2013 Poets & Writers magazine.

Click on the following link (links are in light grey type) to read the opening from Bill Cheng's first novel, Southern Cross The Dog. Note the nouns he uses. Comment on three nouns that you think are the most powerful, the most precise, the ones that create the clearest pictures. Explain at least one of your three choices in more detail.


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