Sure, punctuation is all handy and cool when you’re writing that novel, but do you really need it staring over your shoulder while you read? (And am I the only one miffed by the lack of an interrobang?)
What, no Interrobang?? (click image to visit Tabisso website)
Carl Hiassen’s satirical novels cut right to the bone, and I don’t know if I’ve ever read anything funnier — or more beautifully targeted (Skin Tight and Double Whammy remains favorites). Enjoy this short interview (I did):
After performing four weeks of work in the last two weeks, one of these would have been handy; a typewriter that translates words into… cocktails.
Every writer who could use one of these, raise your hand...
The last several weeks have been packed with work, including some painfully comedic (painful for me, comedic for bystanders) interactions with a client so clueless she’s more “The Office” character than real person.
This person singlehandedly generates enough material for a two-posts-a-week “client follies” blog, and the only thing stopping me is that the screwups are so singularly bizarre, my readers wouldn’t believe me. (Really.)
Keep writing (because it’s better than drinking), Tom Chandler.
I received an email from Igloo about the potential for product reviews on my fly fishing blog, yet when I responded, my email bounced back — the victim of a “User not registered with ContentCatcher” anti-spam filter error.
I’m no PR professional (I haven’t even played one on the Internet), but sending emails to media folks whose replies are going to be blocked seems like a marginal strategy.
(Unless this is this some kind of existentialist PR strategy that forces me to confront the meaninglessness of my online existence, rendering me more amenable when the real contact comes.)
Full Disclosure: I got out of PR decades ago because this is precisely the kind of thing I’d do.
The Intertubes are powerful, but they’re no longer simple. And done right, marketing is still “Death by a Thousands Paper Cuts.”
I recently said TV/Hollywood scriptwriting was writing’s most spectator-friendly sport, and recent events suggest I’m dead-bang right about that.
While copywriters bore the writing universe with our hopelessly self-promoting tweets, the world’s scriptwriters are creating world-class writing industry entertainment, this time in the form of a lawsuit brought by one Justin Samuels, who alleges that Hollywood simply locks out non-whites, women, and those who are not wealthy:
Yes, you do indeed need to be in the right social circles to do what you said. You’d need wealthy parents—disproportionately white—or some sort of backing where you basically didn’t have to work in order to schmooze with film people all the time. You seem to have glossed over the part where I lived and worked in Los Angeles. At times, I worked long hours, commuted long hours. It’s why I said the idea where one must meet people basically favors wealthy white people who can live a certain lifestyle.
(In Hollywood, “important” people usually won’t read your spec script unless you’re repped by an agent, an arrangement Samuels believes is discriminatory.)
I spotted the legal concept in play here, though I’m not clear on the actual legal cite for “They’ve got a trust fund and I don’t.”
Still, you don’t have to be a Harvard Law graduate to see the door opening for a potentially lucrative “They’ve got real talent, the smug bastards” lawsuit — especially if you’ve got a couple points (gross, not net) of the TV rights.
For those with little useful work to do, here’s a link to the John August post on the lawsuit (good background), and here’s the interview from the Working Screenwriter blog.
Unsurprisingly, the comments below both articles are fairly caustic (probably all from that sniveling bunch of trust funders who control Hollywood), and while I’d love to see this one played out with all the fanfare of a Lady Gaga appearance, I’m guessing it will disappear after first exposure to a judge, who — after handing copies of his just-finished spec script to the agency lawyers — will simply smile and go to lunch.
Keep writing (and suing your way to the top), Tom Chandler.
After I left my first ad agency job, I wrote the usual novice copywriter projects (data sheets, brochures, trade ads, press releases, etc) for a lighting controls company.
I got tired of looking at their ugly, essentially hand-drawn logo, so one day I renovated it in what I’ll now call “Early Digital Ugly” style.
It was not a pretty thing.
Just yesterday, the art director who worked on their packaging over two decades ago sent me an email about electricians installing lighting controls in his office — which turned out to be our former client’s.
Amazingly, they still use the exact same data/installation sheet template he designed 25 years ago, and perversely, the boxes and sheets also featured the exact — and still awful — logo I’d created.
I’m proud of a lot of the concepts and copy I’ve written, but copywriters know their work typically lives a pretty short life (a couple years or less).
That the worst piece of crap I ever did — a logo no less — has now endured for decades suggests something unpleasant — like the existence of an ironic god.
Everybody has a few creative/copywriting skeletons in their closet, but I thought this one was buried decades ago.
Any similar projects from my readers’ past ever pop up years after the crime?
Keep writing with the knowledge it might be around forever, Tom Chandler.
(Created by HappyPlace.com [plenty more where this came from] and found at OrgTheory.net)
As a writer, I love the little writing tools that solve nagging problems. That’s why I write in a programmer’s text editor (Emacs or Komodo Edit). And why I became obsessed with how John August — the screenwriter behind the deeply interesting JohnAugust.com screenwriting blog — posts formatted script snippets on his blog.
The nicely formatted JohnAugust.com screenwriting blog
I don’t need to do this very often (it would have been nice when I blogged about video scripting), but things like this tend to knock around in the back of my brain.
In short, it nagged at me.
I mucked around with code tags and nothing worked — until I discovered August developed a WordPress plug-in that formats the script snippets for you (also available for other CMS installs like Blogger and Drupal).
For infrequent users, there’s also an online converter.
INT. BLOG PAGE
The BLOGGER and READER sit on opposite sides of the screen, staring at each other through the display.
READER
You want to cross a script with a blog post? You’re mad!
BLOGGER twirls mustache, leans forward until nose almost touches screen, pushes key on keyboard. READER’s keyboard flows up, manacles hands, trapping him. READER struggles.
BLOGGER
I’m not mad. I’m a writer.
BLOGGER pushes another key, blog post overlaying screen begins to mutate, snaps off screen to engulf reader’s face.
READER
Aiiiiyeeeee!
BLOGGER
Another satisfied reader.
The screenwriting world is a fascinating arm of the writing galaxy; the stakes are huge, the competition fierce, the failures embarrassingly public and the amount of work done on spec is staggering.
Still, it’s perhaps the most spectator friendly of the writing sports, and while I have zero interest in playing, I am interested for the sheer spectacle of it.
If I find a cool tool along the way…
Keep writing (and uncovering the tools that make it easier), Tom Chandler.
Sure, the clothes are horrifying and the mustache frightens small children, but can you honestly visualize the pitch meeting where the ad agency folks pitched this surreal, multi-dimensional, voice-over-by-alien spot to the client?
I can’t.
I’ll bet the words “cutting edge” were tossed about by the (presumably cravat-wearing) creative director. And that the copywriter was sure — positive even — that he’d acquire Pet Rock levels of fame for this game-changing bit of copy genius.
(Found via the always-interesting HowToBeARetronaut site)
Letters of Note remains a favorite blog; it posts images of letters from celebrities/creative people/historical figures (transcribed texts also), and for someone always happy for a peek behind the curtain, it’s pure entertainment.
Today’s letter is from John D. MacDonald, who — as a young writer — endured the usual barrage of editor’s rejection slips. When he became famous and demand for his work soared, he amusingly crafted a satirical “Editor Rejection Letter.”
Dear Editor:
Don’t be upset about receiving this form letter!
We would like to write a personal letter to each and every one of you, but the great mass of stories submitted from this office makes such a procedure impractical. Surely you can understand that!
If by any chance we have been unable to use your magazine, don’t be discouraged. It may not be due to any particular deficiency in the magazine, but instead to the fact that we haven’t recently been writing the type of THING that you use.
Try again, won’t you?
And, we beg of you – DON’T BE DISCOURAGED!
Affectionately,
John D. MacDonald
MacDonald was playing out the fantasy of a lot of writers — and turnabout is fair play in this instance — but his gently satirical efforts were nothing in comparison to Norman MacLean’s rejection letter to a publisher who accepted his first manuscript, then screwed around with it for a while before dropping it.
That manuscript went on to become the hugely acclamied “A River Runs Through It,” and when the same publisher courted MacLean’s second book (Young Men and Fire), he reacted, uhhh… poorly:
You must have known that Alfred A. Knopf turned down my first collection of stories after playing games with it, or at least the game of cat’s-paw, now rolling it over and saying they were going to publish it and then rolling it on its back when the president of the company announced it wouldn’t sell. So I can’t understand how you could ask if I’d submit my second manuscript to Alfred A. Knopf, unless you don’t know my race of people. And I can’t understand how it didn’t register on me – ‘Alfred A. Knopf’ is clear enough on your stationery.
But, although I let the big moment elude me, it has given rise to little pleasures. For instance, whenever I receive a statement of the sales of ‘A River Runs Through It’ from the University of Chicago Press, I see that someone has written across the bottom of it, ‘Hurrah for Alfred A. Knopf.’ However, having let the great moment slip by unrecognized and unadorned, I can now only weakly say this: if the situation ever arose when Alfred A. Knopf was the only publishing house remaining in the world and I was the sole remaining author, that would mark the end of the world of books.
This is only a portion of MacLean’s letter; you can see what revenge (or bitterness) looks like here.
Keep writing (even rejection letters), Tom Chandler.
Twain’s been called the “father of American literature” and he was damned funny to boot, and I’m happy to see the US Postal Service is issuing a stamp in his honor:
Twain’s not doing bad for a dead guy; he’s got his own website and a stamp…
Every creative person needs their own personal creative mission statement—an exploration of their artistic psyche so profound (and so pretentious), nobody can even come close to understanding it.
I used to rely on the pithy “Wretched, yet impertinent” as my creative vision statement, but may update it now that I’ve visited the Arty Bollocks Generator, which generates some seriously high class gibberish like:
My work explores the relationship between the body and midlife subcultures.
With influences as diverse as Blake and John Cage, new combinations are crafted from both explicit and implicit layers.
Ever since I was a student I have been fascinated by the theoretical limits of the mind. What starts out as hope soon becomes corroded into a tragedy of temptation, leaving only a sense of chaos and the prospect of a new synthesis.
As shifting forms become frozen through emergent and personal practice, the viewer is left with a statement of the limits of our condition.
If you don’t immediately fall in love with “leaving only a sense of chaos and the prospect of a new synthesis” then you’re simply not an artist.
Finally, automated pretension...
Keep visioning, Tom Chandler.
Bad Behavior has blocked 948 access attempts in the last 7 days.
