LibraryThing

Hey folks -

Here's a site you might want to check out - I thought it was pretty cool and as soon as I get a chance I'll start filling my cyber shelves...

The name of the place is LibraryThing and basically it gives you an opportunity to catalog your bookshelf, as well as, create a must read list - while at the same time - giving you yet another chance to commune with folks who share (or don't share) your literary tastes, so to speak.

Neato, neato I say!

Carry on...

Love does not die a natural death

Harry decided, on a rainy February morning, that the only way he could free himself from the pain he was feeling was to kill his love for Marianne. Left to its own devices over the past 12 months, the love, if anything, had grown stronger, although it had changed. What had been adoration was now a mixture of obsession and loathing. He was aware of this and it disturbed the still rational part of his heart. He had never wanted this but he had predicted it. There was the tragedy. “My love for you,” he had told her, “is an all-consuming thing. I love you and that’s that. You don’t love me enough, and that’s that too.”

“I do love you, Harry,” she said, “but…”

So Harry began to replay in his head their conversations of old and put new inflexions to the voices. He invented suspicions about the reasons why she hadn’t called him or why she hadn’t written or why she didn’t do this rather than that. He created her character anew. She was fickle, she was shallow, she was neurotic, she was confrontational, she was shrill, she was arrogant, she was evasive, she lied. She didn’t know how to love. She didn’t know what love was. And so on.

These phantoms, these creations, these imaginings, infused their occasional and increasingly uncomfortable meetings, and filled them with misery and by June they hated each other.

Harry woke up on the morning of 7th June and, looking in the bathroom mirror, saw over his left shoulder, in the distance, the shadowy figure of the love of his life, the source of his heartbreak, the object of his desire this past several years. And he realised he couldn’t quite make out her features.

He lathered his whiskers and whistled and the shadow disappeared.

And in the ethereal distance, the shadow shed a tear.

Andrew

Andrew sat fishing and shivering on the bank of Ormerod’s reservoir as the daylight began to fade, the breeze died and the buzzy insects made delicate rings on the surface of the water, touching it, touching it.

He shifted his weight and his wicker fishing basket creaked under him, its feet sinking into the soft earth. His feet were getting cold as the dampness struck up through his shoes. He should have worn his wellies and two pairs of socks when fishing, like his was always telling him. He should have been home before dark, like his mother was always telling him. He should have done his homework by now, like his mother was always telling him. He should have minded his own business, like his mother told him that afternoon.

“It’s nothing a ten year old boy needs know about,” she said. “What your father gets up to is no concern of yours so mind your own business.”

“But where are those men taking dad?” he asked again. “And why did they say they’d be back to search the house, top to bottom?”

“For the love of God, Andrew, will you mind your own business!” she shrieked at him, her hands wringing the corners of her pinny, her face contorted with worry.

Couldn’t have made it plainer, could she! His face stung as her words slapped him. Unexpected. Unlike her. His mother of ample bosom and ample kindness, and ample steak and kidney pie! Tears pricked his eyes and he ran upstairs to his room where humiliation and anger in equal quantities filled his heart with… with what? With frustration and hurt and a desire to show her! Yes, to show her! He’d show her alright.

He climbed onto the banister on the landing, eased open the loft hatch, pushed it back and pulled himself up and through, a ten year old monkey. Fumbling under the cold water tank, he pulled out a package, stuffed it underneath his shirt and climbed back down. There are no secret hiding places that a ten year old monkey can’t find in his own home.

Andrew let himself out of the front door, closing it quietly behind him, and legged it into town where the contents of the package bought him the best fishing tackle he could find in Baites’s Tackle and Baits shop.

That’d show her alright!

And now he sat with his new, expensive fishing tackle as the night closed in, fishless, shivering and frightened to go home.

When it finally got dark, really dark, he started to cry and as he cried he took the remaining notes from the package and began tearing them into small pieces, grinding them underfoot into a pulpy, muddy mass, so they wouldn’t be recognised, so nobody would know he had taken them. He counted them as he tore them. Three thousand pounds in total.

He’d leave the fishing tackle there, he decided. He daren’t take it home. He’d hide it under a bush. Or something… anything

As he tore up the last note, his tears and snot combining to turn his face silvery streaked in the moonlight, the light from a torch picked him out. He jumped like a startled rabbit but couldn’t move.

“Andrew!” called an approaching voice. Andrew, stay there, I’m coming over.”

His father reached him and pulled him to his feet and hugged him. “Thank God,” he said, “you daft little bugger. I thought you’d gone and run away.”

“Where did you go dad?” Andrew blubbed. “Why did mum shout at me like that?”

“It’s ok, son, I’m going nowhere, and your mother’s sorry.”

He shone his torch on the fishing tackle, then at the pulped mess of paper and mud on the ground.

“They didn’t find anything,” he said, “and I don’t suppose they will now.”

“What do you mean, dad?” said Andrew.

“Mind your own business, son,” said his dad. “Mind your own business. And don’t forget your new tackle. It’ll do for your birthday. Come on, let’s go home. And, thanks son.”

“What for, dad?”

“Mind your own business, son, mind your own business.”

Opinions may be closer than they appear

I was told once, by a professor of creative writing, that nobody really likes to read Flannery O’Connor. This professor continued by saying, “I mean, I like what she has to say about writing but nobody wants to sit down and read her work for pleasure. Of course, it's one of those things you aren’t supposed to admit.”

I was in my last year of college at the time and oddly enough it reminded me of an incident years before when I was just a baby bird, a freshman in high school. The assignment was to prepare both a written report and an oral presentation based on our favorite book. During my oral presentation the bell rang, class was over and people started to scatter. I turned to my teacher and asked, “Should I just finish tomorrow, then?” And she said, “God no, just hand it in. I can’t take any more, I hate that crap.” The subject of my report, you might be asking? J.R.R. Tolkien’s The Hobbit.

There are many points to be drawn, many inferences to be made about those two examples; two isolated examples of what might seem relatively benign exchanges between student and teacher. I think, though, that I’ll let you make those on your own.

What I would like to say is that I read Flannery O’Connor for pleasure. In fact, she’s one of the three men I admire the most, the father, son and the holy ghost, except in my trio you could sing, if you were inclined to do so, the three women I admire the most, O’Connor, Welty and Munro. And here is why – because they don’t let their writing get in the way of telling a story, that’s why…well, that’s one reason why, but that’s enough.

And, although it has been quite a long time since I’ve read his work, I still love J.R.R. Tolkien – in fact, that set of books contributed an absolutely untold amount to my love of literature and for writing. I read them avidly as a child and they had my little mind working on all six cylinders, my imagination working overtime – pistons firing and fuel flowing. And in retrospect, all the many hours I spent thumbing page after page through all four of those books were better spent than any single second I wasted camped in front of the TV watching Mel’s Diner or One Day at a Time or Love Boat or Fantasy Island or Dallas, etc etc etc. (I’ll not add Sesame Street, The Electric Company or Mr. Rogers or Captain Kangaroo to that list of wasted TV time though.

My list of favorite writers is long and constantly growing - if you're interested you can visit a very early post from the Writers' Blog.

Belle and Jimmy Jamey

She was gaunt and pasty-faced and loved Jimmy Jamey with a passion that belied her otherwise hard nature. Nancy and Bill Sykes sprang to mind as role models for the pair of them.

Jimmy was a drunk, and a violent drunk at that. He was also immensely strong, raw-boned strong, having spent all his working life as a brickie’s labourer. If he climbed a ladder once with a hod full of bricks in a day, he climbed the ladder a hundred times and more. It was easy to him but he liked a drink when he’d done, to replace the fluid he’d lost in sweat, he said.

Jimmy was famous for having thrown the fat sergeant almost clean over a car one night. It took six of them to hold him down and one to crack his head open with a truncheon before he went quiet. Jimmy pleaded guilty to police assault, being drunk and disorderly and damaging a car but he didn’t mind because he got double helpings of breakfast in the police cells. Jimmy was ok, they said, when he didn’t have drink inside him.

Belle thought so too.

They lived together, on and off, in Cluster House, the 10 floor high-rise 1960s block of concrete slabbed council flats – all piss-smelling and wailing noises in the night, all piss-smelling and quiet as the grave in the day. Most of the inhabitants slept during the day. They pissed at any old time, or so it seemed.

Jimmy got raging, blind, stupid drunk one Christmas Eve and punched a man so hard he fractured his skull. He nearly died in Intensive Care. Jimmy was sorry when he sobered up and offered all the money he had in the police Prisoners’ Property Cupboard to his victim’s wife so she could ‘buy herself something nice for Christmas being as her husband wasn’t very well’.

Jimmy was sent down for 18 months on the Wednesday. On Thursday, Belle took an overdose of Paracetamol and died as Sergeant Marsh broke down the door to her flat after Gordon at the Rose and Crown rang the Station to say he was worried about her. Fatty Marsh picked his way across the sticky, pissy floor of the carpetless lounge, stepping over bundles of clothing and cardboard boxes, and found Belle lying on her back on the kitchen floor. She was wearing a clean white candlewick dressing gown and red nail varnish. A cigarette, still alight, rested on her chest, slowly charring a hole in the white gown. Fatty removed it and ground it out with his heel.

There was a note on the blue, formica-topped kitchen table. It said this, in pencil, in beautiful handwriting: I cannot live without Jimmy. I love him. Goodbye.

An empty Paracetamol bottle sat on the table next to the note, the white cap just behind it.

"Notify the Coroner, please,” said Fatty Marsh into his personal radio. “It’s a suicide at 75A Cluster Court. No need for CID but ask Scenes of Crime to attend, please, and the Police Surgeon to certify death. Oh, and ask Ramsden’s to come and pick the body up once the Coroner’s been informed. There’s nobody else needs telling. She lives on her own. There’s no relatives.”

Small Press markets for writers

There's a whole host of potential outlets for your writing here:

http://www.gcwriters.org/publish_links.htm

Poetry in motion?

From today's Scotsman on Sunday:

Word's out on a unique cultural collaboration

by ANNA MILLAR ARTS CORRESPONDENT

IT IS going to be difficult for the music critics to pan the lyrics on this album. Some of Scotland's leading writers and musicians have joined forces in an unprecedented cultural collaboration due to hit record stores later this summer.

Writers such as Edwin Morgan, Ian Rankin and Alasdair Gray have been paired with bands including Idlewild and The Trashcan Sinatras in one of the most unusual and ambitious artistic projects undertaken in Scotland in decades.

Each of the 17 tracks of the CD involved a big-name writer producing the lyrics and a top band or artist writing the music. The result, according to Idlewild singer Roddy Woomble, pictured, is a "a very special concept poetry record".

The album, due for general release this September, has its modest roots in a letter written several years ago.

Woomble wrote to Morgan asking if he would pen something for the band. Morgan obliged and wrote the lyrics for a track called 'Scottish Fiction' on the band's The Remote Part album. The song's success inspired Woomble to think about a project on a bigger scale.

Woomble said: "Since Edwin worked with us we have kept in regular contact. Last autumn when we met again he had written some more lyrics for us.

"As a project - on any level - this idea works because it's exciting for any musician to put music to lyrics of such a high standard. Likewise, for writers it is great for them to hear their work on a different level."

The project was originally supposed to stretch to no more than an EP but "morphed happily out of control" earlier this year when other Scottish writers discovered the idea and started sending their own lyrics to Woomble for inclusion.

Leading Scots producers Chemikal Underground Records came on board to produce and the resulting 17 tracks are, said Woomble, "a very important album".

Among the highlights are collaborations between Teenage Fanclub's singer and guitarist Norman Blake and John Burnside, Sons and Daughters and writer-turned comedian AL Kennedy, Arab Strap's Aidan Moffatt and Ian Rankin, and Fife's own King Creosote and The Cutting Room author Louise Welsh.

Folk singer-songwriter Vashti Bunyan and No Fireworks novelist Rodge Glass will also make an appearance. Elsewhere, The Trashcan Sinatras and Whitbread winner Ali Smith will join forces.
Woomble said an element of surprise added to the appeal for everyone involved: "The writers didn't necessarily know who they were going to be paired up with musically so as a result the musicians were really excited about it and enjoyed the selection process."

The majority of the tracks have now been recorded in Chemikal Underground Records' studio in Glasgow.

Their company's producer and The Delgados guitarist, Alun Woodward - who will also appear on the album as a musician in a musical collaboration with Alasdair Gray - said he had been heartened by the extent to which the project's scale had grown organically from humble beginnings.

Woodward said: "People approached us because they were interested in the idea and then, additionally, we had a think about the people we wanted to get on board and then we went to them. The result is more than we could have anticipated."

The producer said the pairings had brought some interesting results: "The collaborations have been a huge success. To do either of the jobs involved you have to be very creative so to have two or more very artistic people working like this is always going to bring really impressive results. I've heard some of the samples already and have been absolutely impressed by the quality.

"It's amazing to see the relationships being formed. A lot of writers are really into music and similarly a lot of musicians are very inspired by writers."

Alasdair Gray will design a cover for the CD and Edwin Morgan will select a title, inspired by the total body of work on the album.

Woodward added: "To have two literary giants like Alasdair and Edwin involved in both the design and the naming of the album really helps to put the project into perspective: it's just a very special, lovely thing."

A spokesman for the Scottish Arts Council said: "We are happy to be involved with a project, which brings together some of Scotland's leading talents."

Chemikal Underground Records is currently one of Scotland's most successful independent record labels. Started 10 years ago in Glasgow, it was the brainchild of The Delgados and has gone on to launch the careers of Mogwai and Arab Strap. The as-yet untitled album is due for release in September.

Sweet Sixteen

She couldn’t have been more than 16, all fine blonde hair just touching her shoulders, and virgin white dress.

Sitting at the pavement café, in the sunshine, long legs stretched out in front of her, leaning back in her slightly rickety chair, sideways on to the table, she drank orange juice through a straw. It was the straw that put the final touch to her age. Although a woman might drink from a straw in public, no girl of any maturity worth talking about would be seen dead with anything less than a bottle of designer lager.

She was gauche, you could tell. A filly. A maiden. A girl on the cusp, all innocence and expectation, the body well ahead of the emotions in the race for fulfilment.

She smiled a dreamy little smile, her face lighting up at some secret thought, her eyes crinkling, as yesteryear’s writers would put it, in a manner most becoming.

Middle aged men couldn’t help but look, once, twice, three times as they passed, memories of their own youth rekindled, memories recalled of their unreciprocated teenage passion for the town beauty.

Middle aged women couldn’t help but look as they passed too, and they sighed for something lost or for something that, for them, had never existed.

Men of 20 or so passed and lust leapt within them. They were cursed

Women of 20 or so passed and envy reared its head. They were cursed too.

The boy sitting with her, at the pavement café, in the sunshine, elbows on the table, staring at her, his thoughts obvious to all, proprietorial and guarded, aggressive in his body language which cried out ‘Keep Off, she’s mine’… this boy, with love in his heart so enormous and tumultuous that he thought he would die, leaned across the table and whispered something to the beautiful child-woman.

She turned to face him and the sunshine lit her as a spotlight catches an actress on stage. And the passers by slowed. And the other pavement café customers looked at her. And the waiter stopped to listen.

“You can fuck off, big-time,” she said to the boy. And she went back to drinking her orange juice through a straw.

And the world, disenamoured, continued in weary fashion.

The LIbrary

Tom sat in the library café, sipping a coffee, reading the Herald Tribune in the absence of anything more interesting, and wasting an hour or so. He looked up from a story about the United Nations and yawned. A woman walked past him and headed for the stairs leading to the ground floor level and exit. She was wearing black jeans, a short black leather jacket and she had brown hair. She was both slim and curvy, but not too much of either. Tom couldn’t see her face.

He watched as she walked away from him, her black, low-heeled shoes tip-tapping on the tiled floor. He noted, almost abstractedly, how her hips swayed as she walked, the most simple of movements defining her gender, complementing her curves, accessorising her dress sense. As her weight transferred to the right foot - ‘tip’ - her right hip rose an inch or so and her left hip dipped in reaction. As her weight transferred to her left foot - ‘tap’ - the hips inclined the other way.

She looked neither to the right nor to the left, avoiding all eye contact, Tom assumed, as is the way with women. His detachment eased. He thought she looked attractive. He put down the Herald Tribune and determined to watch the woman until she disappeared from view up the stairs. She as worth watching.

As she climbed the stairs, the swaying of her hips became more exaggerated and Tom noted how her legs angled in from the pelvis, giving her that all-too-common, slightly knock-kneed appearance that women have. He found that attractive too. Men do.

She stopped, quite suddenly, on the fourth stair up, turned around and looked directly at Tom. She was stunningly pretty and her look was open and direct and disconcerting. Tom blushed. He picked up his Herald Tribune but couldn’t help but look up again. She was still looking at him. He looked away. He looked back. She was still looking at him. Tom’s confusion increased.

A man walked past Tom and joined her on the stairs. Still she stared at Tom. The man touched her on her arm and as she turned to him with a start he kissed her lightly on her cheek.

“Penny for your thoughts? You looked miles away.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, “I was thinking about what to buy for dinner, that’s all. Salmon or chicken? You choose.”

“Salmon, I think,” he said.

“Salmon it is, then,” she said, and they continued up the stairs with not a backward glance.

WORDSMITH PROJECT 2

OK, so here's a bit more lunacy for people. I was inspired by a daft post on my own blog at www.highland-dreams.blogspot.com to devise the next Wordsmith Project which, this time, will have a musical edge to it. I've written the first verse of traditional blues song such as you would hear on Sauchielhall Street in Glasgow every Monday and now invite all and sundry to write their own verse(s) which might (or might not - depending on the judgement of the editorial team) become part of the finished song or, more likely, be first held up to public ridicule before being deleted :o)))

I hope to twist the arm of my musician son, Adam, to play, sing and record the wretched result of our combined wretched efforts, and then I'll make it available for public listening and lampoonery.

So, here's the first beautifully crafted verse, full of angst, misery, world weariness and exotic, wild animals. I'll post it on my own blog simultaneously but it is to the email address on THIS blog (Writers' Blog) that all new verses should be sent. Hopefully, the song will grow there until a natural ending is reached or until I have to kill it. As with Wordsmith 1, one of us will probably write the final bit just so you can all groan some more.

Have fun!

Bloggin’ Blues

Woke up this morning, mmmmm,
Got myself those old bloggin’ blues.
Yeah, woke up this morning,
Got myself those old bloggin’ blues.
Spoke to my sweet baby, she say,
Honey, it’s all on account of those kangaroos.

Haunted by ghosts.

I'm too busy ghostwriting at present to spare much time for Writers' Bloggery - the pressure of deadlines, even self-imposed, is one of the great delights of being a freelance! :-)) So anyway, I thought I'd use a ghost writer to do WB today.

What Is a Ghostwriter
by Gary McLaren

Do you believe in ghosts?

They are mostly unseen. Unnoticeable. And believe it or not they are moving behind the scenes in the publishing industry. If you're lucky you might catch a fleeting glimpse. They are officially called 'ghostwriters'.

A ghostwriter is a writer who writes on an assigned topic under someone else's name, with their consent. They often write books completely from scratch but sometimes their work involves rewriting or polishing an existing work.

Most books by famous personalities are actually written by ghostwriters. When you see an autobiography or memoir from a politician, businessperson, or celebrity, chances are that it has been written by a ghostwriter.

Here are a few examples. The autobiography "Ronald Reagan: An American Life" was ghosted by Robert Lindsey. "Learning to Sing", the autobiography of American Idol star Clay Aiken, was written with ghostwriter Allison Glock. The autobiographies of Doris Day and Sophie Loren were written by A.E. Hotchner.

So how popular is ghostwriting? Statistics are hard to come by since many people don't want to reveal that their book is ghosted. Some industry estimates suggest that up to fifty percent of all non-fiction books are ghostwritten.

A client may decide to hire a ghostwriter because the client does not have any writing talent or because they are too busy. Ghostwriters, for their part, are usually well-established writers already, and are selected on that basis.

What do Ghostwriters Write?
Ghostwriters are hired to write many types of documents, from autobiographies for famous personalities to e-books for internet marketing gurus, and even letters for politicians.

They also write fiction. Sometimes it is for a series of books written by several ghostwriters under one name, as with the stories of Nancy Drew or The Hardy Boys. Ghostwriters also continue to write novels under the name of popular authors who have died, as in the case of Robert Ludlum.

Is Ghostwriting Ethical?
Although ghostwriting is a widely accepted practice within the publishing industry, some people outside of the industry complain that ghostwriting is deceptive. But that is not necessarily true. Consider for a moment the ghostwriting process. The client is the author of the work in that they are the person who is really behind the content. It is the client's ideas, the client's stories and experiences. It is the client's words recorded on hours of interview tapes. The ghostwriter is a professional consultant providing expertise in the area of bringing together all the information, organizing it, and writing it up in a way that will produce a marketable and readable masterpiece.

What Skills does a Ghostwriter Need?
A ghostwriter must be a good writer.

He or she should also have good interviewing skills, since they will spend many hours and days interviewing clients. They should have the ability to ask good questions that will draw out the best aspects of a story.

Another skill - which may need to be developed - is the ability to maintain the client's voice so that the book reads like the client, not the ghostwriter.

How is a Ghostwriter Paid?
Ghostwriters usually charge a flat fee for their work.

Sometimes they will reduce their ghostwriting fee in return for a percentage (perhaps 25-50%) of the royalties, or in rare cases they may waive their fee in return for a percentage of royalties.

The advantage of a flat fee is that a ghostwriter knows exactly how much he or she will be paid. The risk of relying on royalties is that even if the book is well-written, the ghostwriter has no control over the book's marketing and promotion.

Does a Ghostwriter get Any Credit?
More often than not, the public never knows that a book was ghostwritten. Sometimes ghostwriters are even legally bound to not reveal that they have ghosted a particular book.

Occasionally ghostwriters will receive some credit. The writer's name may appear on the cover as a co-author or it might read "as told to Jenny Ghost." Another way to thank the ghostwriter is under the acknowledgements, for example "...and thanks to Joe Ghoul without whom this book would never have been completed".

Are You Thinking of Becoming a Ghostwriter?
It could be an excellent career move. You've probably heard it said that everyone has a book inside them. Well, the fact of the matter is that not everyone has the time or the skill to write it.

As long as there is a story to be told, ghostwriters will continue to be in demand.

© Copyright 2006 Gary McLaren.

About The Author Gary McLaren is the editor of Worldwide Freelance Writer, a leading source of information for freelance writers. http://www.worldwidefreelance.com/ghostwriting.htm. If you would like more information on starting a ghostwriting business, check out http://www.worldwidefreelance.com/i/58.htm

P.S. In addition to Nicki's current ghostwriting of a 1st World War novel, Amy has now been hired to ghostwrite a romantic novel for a Scottish client. I am the only one not ghostwriting, for which I am very grateful. But, this shows that there is considerable call for ghostwriting skills. Wooooooh!
Charlie

Suitably Employed

John was charming and shallow and wore well-pressed, expensive suits even when not at work. He was always very careful to be in or around the main entrance on Monday, Wednesday and Friday mornings around 8.30, which just happened to be the time that T.W. was decanted from his chauffeur-driven Jaguar not three feet from the brass-bound doors, brief case in hand and secretary already at his side.

Joe, the uniformed concierge, would open the door for him, saluting discretely.

“Good morning Sir Timothy,” John would say and smile a gleaming white-toothed smile at his Company’s Chief Executive.

“Morning,” Sir Trevor would say, beaming back at John.

“Good morning,” his attractive secretary would say, although she had no need to smile back and therefore kept it to herself for use at some more important time.

John would busy himself for a moment or two with a file of papers he always carried, shuffling through it as though looking for the document upon whose very existence the financial viability of The Company depended. When he failed to find it, he would return to his office in the Management Services Department and continue with the compilation of Health and Safety Registers (Production Lines – Manchester -Managers Only).

“It would look bad if I was there every morning,” he said yet again to Robin who sat at the desk next to him and whose duty it was to compile Headquarters Memoranda (Staff Deployments) after Robin had aimed in his direction another of ‘those looks’. “But my dad told me the best way to get noticed was to be seen by, to smile at and to be courteous to the top man.”

“Sound advice,” said Robin, reading a memorandum that lay on his desk, signed by Sir Timothy’s secretary pp Sir Timothy and headed ‘Memorandum to Personnel Services – Investigation Required Into Main Door Reception Staffing Levels’. “If I were you, John, I’d be there every morning just to make sure. I understand your plan for career advancement is working. Sir Timothy has noticed you.”

John smiled gleaming white-toothed smile of gratitude.

“You know, I might just do that. Thanks Robin.

A reader writes

Slapchips raises some interesting points on the interconnection between reading and writing:

‘Hi Nicki

I'm not a writer, but it interests me and I've been writing a travel journal of sorts over the last few months. I thought that if I began writing about real stuff I could develop my style and move onto more fictional writing. This is the plan anyway. I've been so busy typing though that I've neglected to interact with other bloggers, which makes me feel a bit like a hermit emerging from his cabin. Regarding your blog, I agree that reading may be done on different levels. I especially find that reading is enriched by the awareness writing brings to it: if I've been battling with problems of tense say, I greedily grab a book to see how a particular writer deals with these problems. One more thing about reading and writing: it's uncanny how the act of writing your own material seems so divorced from the act of reading it. I'll write something thinking it's ok, only to then read through it and find it useless. Or vice versa. Writing and reading seem to lie on different cognitive levels. Or is this part of becoming a good writer: the better you get the more the two levels are in sync with each other?'

I have been talking (see recent posts) about how reading intelligently helps writers to improve their own writing: Slapchips turns this on his head and points out that as we develop our skills as writers we get far more out of what we read. Now that’s made me think about the whole question of how the two ineract, in a way I haven’t previously done.

I do so agree with you on that point, Slapchips. I suppose that it’s the same in whatever field we work – painters must appreciate the skill involved in a particular picture far more than I, who can only look at it and see whether it seems well-executed, whether it pleases me aesthetically: whereas a fellow artist will know just how difficult it is to put the paint on in just that way to produce that effect. Equally, (and those who have been watching the Great British Menu competition on the BBC will have seen this in action) a Michelin-starred chef appreciates the skill involved in dishes produced by other top-class chefs far more than we mere eaters – even though we may love the taste of them. And, I presume, computer programmers appreciate the work of other computer programmers similarly, and so on.

I know what you mean, Slapchips, when you say that reading your own work is very different from writing it. Just like you, until I read back over what I’ve written, I have no idea whether it’s going to be good, bad or indifferent. All I can do when I’m actually writing is just to get the words down in the way they present themselves to me. Then my ‘editing brain’ comes into play and I can work on the rough material to shape it into a finished product which pleases me – or at least, doesn’t make me cringe in the way much of my early work does when I read it now!

I don’t know that I’d argue reading and writing lie on different cognitive levels, however – that doesn’t seem right, intuitively. But I certainly find that nowadays my first draft of a piece of writing is generally far closer to a pleasing finished product than when I first started writing. I don’t think it’s a question of two different levels being ‘in sync’ – it’s more akin to managing to rub my belly and pat my head at the same time: through dint of much practice and experience I am now able to have my reading head engaged while I’m writing. I guess I now automatically edit as I go along, before the words even hit the page, thus leaving that much less editing to do afterwards.

Oh, and by the way, Slapchips - having looked at your blog, I'd take you to task on one point: you are a writer - and a very good one too.

New route into publication for bloggers

This is from journalism.co.uk:

Editors invited to buy bloggers' work
Posted: 1 June 2006 By: Robert Andrews

Newspaper and magazine editors can now buy UK bloggers' posts for re-use in print, thanks to a new content brokering agency due to launch next week.

Members of ScooptWords, which is being launched by the citizen photojournalism agency Scoopt, place a button on their website indicating an article is available for re-publication. Publishers then use the service to make a transaction earning them syndication rights to re-print the post.

The move is the latest in a wave of collaborations that illustrate the increasing value of blogs to printed media. The relaunched Guardian carries a daily blog opinion round-up inside its front page, BlogBurst provides pre-approved weblog articles to US newspaper websites, Associated Press last week began showing bloggers' commentary next to stories syndicated to its customers and the International Herald Tribune is to carry stories written by contributors to Korean citizen journalism network OhmyNews.

ScooptWords managing editor Graham Holliday said his new service differed because it would pay contributors a percentage for their writing via PayPal.

"We don't differentiate between professional rates and blogger rates," he told journalism.co.uk.
"We believe, if it's good enough to print, it's good enough to pay for.Until now, there have only really been three ways for an editor to use that content - they use it but don't pay for it, they plagiarise it, or they approach individual bloggers and buy it or commission them to write something.

"I know of many other bloggers who have had their content copied, stolen or plagiarised so we set this up to offer a transparent - and, we think, fair - way for editors to buy content that they would like to publish.

"An editor can click the button of a member blog and buy one-time territorial rights to publish that content in full or in part in their publication. The blogger gets paid at a rate we negotiate with the editor."

Mr Holliday, a journalist and Bloggies finalist said he had "no idea how much bloggers can make or how much editors are willing to pay" yet.

ScooptWords, which, like Scoopt, relies on assembling writers of quality content with which to lure editors, is working with contributors to bloggers network Nightcap Syndication, many of whom are already published journalists seeking commissions. The service will "actively push" members' work to newsdesks.

Guardian Unlimited assistant editor Neil McIntosh last month advised freelance writers to demonstrate their work to editors by keeping a weblog.