The Second Step's a Doozy

Did I say that the journey began with a single step?  As true as that is, the next step can easily be a detour not imagined when the first one was taken - and so it has turned out.  This has been a year filled with side-tracks, diversions, and unexpected busyness.

 

When our government announced Covid lockdowns and restrictions on mingling with other people, my wife and I looked at each other and shrugged.  

"Not keen on crowds" we said to each other "and always happy pottering in our own garden and doing our own thing - sounds like we have been handed an excuse to live our lives in a fashion most congenial to us"

Within days, we found ourselves "in loco parentis" to grandchildren who had been sent home to do their studying online for an indeterminate period.  What fun!  What wonderful mental exercise for us as we reached back five decades or more to our own long lost schooldays, in search of discarded bits of geometry and algebra - it was amazing just how many forgotten formulae surfaced from the depths.  What wondrous new skills and words did we acquire as we grappled with the many and varied types of software chosen by the many and varied teachers who, only the previous week, had the pleasure of close daily learning experiences with those grandchildren, but now had to find, on short notice, ways of teaching them via the internet. Everyone involved found themselves on the proverbial "steep learning curve" - a trite business cliche that, for once, was deadly accurate.

 

 

 

So much has happened since then - in our family, our community, our country, and the wider world - and we have, like so many others, been busy just keeping up with it all.  Somehow, the time allotted to matters creative was nibbled away by the effort involved in keeping ourselves afloat, and helping other family members in worst straits than us - until the inevitable happened.  The long lapse in creative work began to feel inexcusable, and recommencing the work seemed almost impossible - the creative impulse was swamped by a sense of guilt and failure.

 

 

 

Now, the warnings of the scientists are again proven true, despite the wishful political thinking that had gained the upper hand, and Christmas is to be held under restrictive conditions, due to the virus once again slipping through our defences. 

 

The garden is soggy, but productive, as La Nina helps us recover from the horror and dessication of last summer's drought and bushfires - our creek is busy with minnows, crayfish, and small perch (who are growing fast) but no trout - the cicadas have had a bumper year, and the night is full of frog song. Clutches of ducklings, baby magpies, and parrots have visited our garden with their parents, learning which of the neighbourhood humans are soft touches for a bit of extra tucker. One of my 18 year old Apple Tree bonsais has flowered for the first time, and set tiny fruit.

 

 

 

The human grandchildren have resumed normal schedules, and we can allow the trigonometry and calculus to slip back into the oblivion of ancient memory - and now, with time on our hands, there is no excuse for not picking up the frayed threads and setting to work again.  Let's see what next year brings.  Ours has turned out pretty well, in the end - I hope it all comes good for you, too.

Types of Victory

This is not the first novel I have set myself to writing.  Previous efforts grew tangled and turgid, despite the simplicity and clarity of the initial concept, until, even if an ending was reached, the work as a whole seemed beyond repair or redemption.  It can make the writer's way seem a long, dark road indeed.

For several years, between short stories, drawing, gardening, family, and a host of other occupations (including paid work), and a great deal of procrastination, I have been pushing the story forward, inch by inch - occasionally even a few yards at a time - until, when I was a bit over half way through, I could suddenly see the ending clearly enough to know what territory remained between where I was and where I wanted to be.  When I arrived at that destination it was a feeling of relief as much as one of victory, but still a victory worth having.

It was an excellent moment, seeing the whole picture of the road ahead - no longer lost, but heading downhill towards a destination long sought. 

How much more wonderful is that feeling of relief that washes over you as you lean back in your chair knowing that the paragraph just laid on the page is, indeed, The End.  The Final Words on the Final Page.  Yes, I know - it isn't really over.  There is yet the second trip, and possibly third, or fourth trip still to be made across that same ground - tidying and trimming, even hacking away dense clumps of excess words.  There will be little additions needed as well, to clarify (or confuse, if that's what you want) the situation for the reader.

Then there are the spelling and grammatical errors that you really do not want present on any page when you do find an editor willing to have a look at your precious creation - nope, the journey seems far from over; and yet the relief remains.  You took an idea and a bucket full of words, scattered them across hundreds of pages - pushed and pulled at the resulting sentences and paragraphs - and so often wondered if you could really cross the finish line with something that wouldn't need consigning to the rubbish bin as soon as you got there.

Today, though, has been a different kind of victory; a victory in the form of a Second Draft complete and tidy in it's plot and style.

No feeling of relief this time, just unalloyed pleasure at the creation emerging from the raw materials.

It is a victory that suddenly makes other victories seem possible - time to go back, perhaps, to some of those other ideas that I thought so good then, and start afresh upon a new road, towards another destination.

The Final Miles

I did say, when first posting on this blog, that writing would be one of the main topics, but lately I have been diverted by flowers, birds, and weather; escaping, possibly, from that part of the writing process I have always found most difficult - polishing the first draft into something that might be worthy of showing to a publisher.

Could that be the attraction of short stories, especially when done in a rush, as per time-limited, prompt based, writing group exercises?  The idea appears - a spark in the dark - and flares like a freshly struck match.  The words pour from the end of the pen, and, minutes later, it is done.  A story sits, entire, on a few sheets of paper.

Complete in itself, it can still benefit from a half an hour of revision - of shifting or cutting words, pulling synomyms from the depths of memory to shift the tone of the writing to better match the story's content.

But a novel.........  after that first spark has faded, and the work has been laid down on the desk to sleep for the night, the spark has to be rekindled the next day, and the day after.  What a victory it is when finally, after so many distractions and side-trips have been negotiated, the first draft rests, complete.

"Put it aside for a while" recommend so many of the books and courses on this topic - and you do, but lurking at the back of your mind are the little discrepancies, anomalies, and contradictions that you know, or suspect, have crept into the narrative as the original idea unfolded from seed to fully grown shrub.  Eventually the author is going to have look again at the tangles and confusion that have crept in as ideas, plot twists, and new characters attached themselves to the original sprout.

Which branches are true grafts, and which merely mistletoe, sucking life from the original?  Where to prune?  Where to twist and redirect so as to let in more light, and where to add extra shade?

And all the while the author is living still in that wider world - the one full of people, politics, and incidents that are calling out for their share of the author's attention.  Many will repay the time they steal with fresh inspiration and source material for new stories.......   and there's the rub.  The world contained in that first draft requires much repair and fine tuning, and all the while, other possible worlds are crying out for space on their own fresh, clean pages.

A friend of mine, years ago, would respond to my harried cries of "I haven't got time!" with a stern admonishment "Well, make time!"  Easier said than done, I sometimes said, but that got me nowhere - it was up to me to decide and act on my priorities. 

How do people manage to live busy lives and still achieve creative goals?  How do you?

An Absent Voice

When I set out writing this novel I began writing at the point that the protagonist is arriving, with family members, at a place he's never been before, noticing things and people that soon have him drawing on his years as an investigator.  As interesting as I found that scene, it was slow paced, and the protagonist was arriving after the incident that forms the core of the story.  Most of the people in town already know something has happened, and at least one may know all the facts. My protagonist is a late-comer (to me, as well as the story) and an outsider, and not everyone will be happy with his involvment.

I realised that I didn't know all the details of that incident, either.  I needed to write it down - to follow the thread of the narrative and see where it took me.  Who done it, and why?  So, I put pen to paper and set out.  A few pages into this I realised that there were people who had witnessed parts of what happened that night, even if they didn't immediately realise it. 

Though they wouldn't be entering the awareness of the protagonist for hours or even days, I had to write their stories, too, so I could understand what their relationship with the protagonist and other characters would be.  I ended up with four "preludes" to the opening chapter that I first wrote.  This is the one about the the character and the moments around which the story is centred.  It has been trimmed, refined, re-written, and trimmed again, and now feels like it should be the opening pages of the book.  What do you think?

SHORT CUT:

Perry laughed as he urged his utility up the steep, overgrown bush track; narrow escapes always filled him with an exultant energy.  The corrugations shook the Hilux sideways across the gravel surface towards the deep, rocky drain on the left.  He eased off the pedal and fought the shuddering steering wheel until the bonnet pointed up the centre of the track again, and then shoved the accelerator to the floor.  Driving with his window down, shivering and shirtless, he was listening through the wind in his ears for the sound that had sent him on this mad dash; the distinctive, burbling roar of a home modified exhaust, unlike any other car in the district.

A few minutes earlier that echoing, V-8 rumble had roused him from a warm bed and sent him running, boots, jeans, and shirt held close, into the cool night air. He had vaulted into his ute and made a crazy, lightless dash down the potholed wheel ruts that led from the house to the dirt road winding along the valley floor. Moonlight and memory got him to the road in one piece, just as the glow of head-lights silhouetted the trees on his right.

The roar of that exhaust was loud and clear as Perry threw the Hilux hard left and stamped on the accelerator, wanting desperately not to be snared by the approaching headlights.  Sharp white beams pierced the billowing dust cloud outside the farm gate as the Hilux fishtailed round the first bend.  He put his foot down and charged into the dappled shadows of the Eucalypts, hoping the kangaroos and wombats had the good sense to stay out of his way.  Behind him, the V-8 faltered briefly, and then roared even louder.

Three kilometres up the valley, Perry found the entry to his short cut and swung hard right.  The moonlight was enough for the pale, sandy road, but the narrow track up the forest-darkened gulley was invisible.  He flicked the parking lights on and lifted his foot a little.  That noisy exhaust was echoing louder again, though his rear-view mirror remained dark.  As he neared the head of the gulley, where the road hair-pinned right, a hint of a glow appeared, far behind; he took the bend fast, sliding on the loose surface, and his mirror was dark again..

Too late, he saw the cluster of potholes that stretched, trench like, across the track, black craters on a dark surface.  He hit the brakes, but the Hilux slammed into the sharp edge at the far side.  It bounced and lurched sideways towards dark tree trunks at the road's edge.  Perry coaxed it back into line and accelerated again, laughing as he realised that the low-slung vehicle behind him would never get through that last obstacle. 

Near misses piqued Perry's sense of adventure, but this one was too close.  A few minutes earlier, he would have been fatally oblivious to that warning rumble.  There could still be consequences in coming days, but Perry could talk his way out of almost any corner – especially over a beer or two. 

He hit the 'go' button on the CD player and began tapping the steering wheel as Highway to Hell thumped out of the speakers.  He turned his headlights on once he had put a forested ridge between himself and his pursuer, and pushed the ute as fast as the rutted, pot-holed track would allow, savouring the cooling tingle of the night air on his bare shoulder and chest, and tasting the joy of another little victory.

His headlights barely reached fifty metres ahead; just enough at this speed to see a roo or wombat if one leapt out of the shadowed undergrowth, but not enough to avoid hitting it.  The Hilux rattled and shuddered its way across the corrugations and protruding rocks, charging up a flickering, tree-lined tunnel of light.  Perry stood on the brakes again, surprised by a hairpin bend he'd thought was still a hundred metres ahead.  The ute slid onto its new course as Perry urged it towards the next hairpin – the third of five that would see him up onto the ridge, and closer to the little used trail that was his short cut home.  Near the top, he swung right onto a larger track – one used by the timber cutters and trail bike riders, mostly.

The forest thinned in that dryer country along the top of the ridge. A wallaby darted away from the noise and light as he began his charge down along the shallow saddle.  Perry braked carefully, looking for its mates, and the turn off that he knew should appear on his right any second.  It would be nice to be home before anyone tried to ring him. 

When the gap in the trees appeared, Perry braked hard and swung the nose of the vehicle sharply onto its new course. He had to fight for control as the tail swung out too far.  The left wheels found the soft edge before he had the Hilux straightened out, but an ominous, flapping growl announced that one of the back tyres was flat.  He pushed on up the slope to the level stretch beyond the first bend as the metal rim began to scrape on the gravel. 

The Hilux wobbled to a stop at the edge of the track as Bon Scott belted out the final phrases of Girls got Rhythm – the music died just before the engine did.  Perry slammed both hands on the steering wheel, then his forehead, and cursed.  He turned off the lights and listened, but apart from the creaking of cooling motor, and the soft, rhythmic thump of a departing kangaroo, the bush was silent.  He reached across to the passenger seat for his jeans, and began to dress, as a distant owl declared its presence.

The full moon was climbing higher as he jacked up the corner of the ute and glared at the shredded tyre.  The wheel nuts clung to the studs, screeching with each tug on the wheel brace.  It was the sort of noise people would hear miles away.  The spare fought with him as well, reluctant to leave its hiding place under the tray.  Months of dust had built up in every thread and track, jamming everything that should move freely.  Sweat dripped from his nose, and trickled down his ribs beneath his shirt, cooling to iciness by the end of its journey.

The spare, when he pulled it free, was flat.  He dragged it out, stood it up, and dropped it again.  It thumped lifelessly to the ground, and Perry gave it a good kick.  Flat as a tack and he'd left his compressor and tools at home before embarking on this night's adventure.

He looked up, startled by the faint whine of an engine, but the sound was gone as quickly as it had come.  He stood for a couple of minutes, listening and watching and working through his limited options.  He used this track because no one else did.  Now he needed a phone or an air pump, and neither looked likely.  Four hundred metres to the Ironstone Ridge track, and then a couple more kilometres pushing his spare tyre, would see him reach a couple of cabins perched on their isolated blocks on the spine of the ridge. 

He'd scouted these shacks two years ago, fruitlessly, he thought at the time, the day after a dance at the community hall.  He was certain, though, that one had a phone connected, and the other had a fairly well stocked workshop, so a compressor, or even a foot pump, was a chance.  He stood the spare up on its edge and gave it a push.  Half an hour later he wondered why he hadn't just driven to the cabins on the ruined tyre.  It would only have ruined the rim, after all; a very expensive rim, as he recalled.  Perry shrugged, cursed the thrifty genes his distant, Highland ancestors had bequeathed him, and kept pushing the flat tyre.

An hour later, he was still looking for the driveway to the first of the shacks.  How fast can a man walk when juggling a large flat tyre along an uneven dirt road?  Not as fast as he had expected, and uphill was easier, it turned out, than trying to restrain the wheel on the downhill sections. The skin on his palms was raw and stinging and his shoulders and back were threatening to go on strike.

Finally, a trace of pale sand shone faintly between two trees on his right.  He stopped in the middle of the moonlit road and stared into the dark tunnel. Fifty metres further along the road, he could see a glimmer of white painted rocks that marked another property entrance.  Perry held the tyre upright with one hand and searched his memory, trying to remember which one had the shed full of tools. 

Both shacks huddled under the trees, fifty metres from the track, but the moonlight was glinting on something metallic part way down the driveway closest to him.  Would someone be here on a Thursday?  He straightened as well as he could and rubbed the small of his back before moving on. 

The tyre had rolled only a metre or so when an engine roared into life.  Blinding white light stabbed out of the driveway as a vehicle accelerated straight at him.  Perry turned and let the tyre fall as he ran towards the trees at the far edge of the track.   The hard surface of the track changed to soft soil and leaves, and low prickly bushes clutched at his legs as the light and noise surged towards him, and gravel crunched as the vehicle skidded to a stop just short of the fallen spare wheel.

The voice that yelled his name was not one he wanted to hear.

It's a Long and Winding Road

First steps, first words - no matter how long the journey looks, it cannot happen without those beginnings.  Yet those first steps can be so hard to take - even if they are not beginning steps, but recommencement steps.  Especially when they are such - when the first stage of a journey is over, and you have stopped to draw breath, it is easy to notice again just how steep is the road ahead, and recall how rugged were some of the places along the road thus far.

It often seems steeper and rougher after a break than it did before you set out in the first place.  When you looked at the distant peak and imagined yourself at its summit, you could not have known just how many times the road would descend into valleys and dark places before climbing back into sunshine and fresh breezes. Achievements are made, the right words and phrases are found, and victories won - you gain the strength and enthusiasm to push on.

So I am back at my own desk, able to wander out into my own garden - though that keeps trying to distract me with all the tasks that need doing.  If I need a break from writing it is safer to amble along the creek bank.  There I can pause among the tree trunks and wait for the minnows and tadpoles to abandon the caution my arrival has provoked, and resume their browsing in the shallows.

If I stand still enough for long enough the bigger fish might cruise past - striped, red finned shadows, visible only when they move - and send the minnows scurrying for cover again - or the family of Kookaburras who patrol the district may bring their new youngsters to the creek bank to practice their foraging skills.  Standing still allows the mosquitoes to find me, of course - but the presence of mozzies brings those sparkling, translucent, blue-jewelled hunters, the damselflies.

One landed on my shoulder the other morning - my khaki shirt resembling a shrub, perhaps.  It sat there for a while - a delicate, perfectly still moment of transparency framed by fine, black lines, and punctuated by a tiny patch of vivid, sky blue; a jewel with wings  - until I turned my head a little too far towards it.  In the serenity of that shady creek bank I encountered something new - the tiny but distinct 'snap' of a damselfly's wings as it launched itself.  It was back a moment later, circling my legs in pursuit of the gathering mosquitoes - I think it caught one, as it flew off and settled on a twig, with something in the basket of its furled legs.

While I stood and watched the water glide slowly along, other things settled on me, too - memories, thoughts, ideas, and notions that busyness and noise can hold at bay.  Like the damselfly and the minnows, stillness suits them.

 
One of those notions related to one of the current news and discussion trends - manhood, toxic or otherwise; what it might be, how it is constructed and performed.  Is there a single, universal definition of "a man"? There wasn't one when I was growing up and asking myself what I was supposed to be doing to become "a man" - the culture around me contained so many different, often contradictory, versions.

What is "manly" behaviour?  I realised that it was one of the driving issues in the novel I am second-drafting at the moment - though I had not set out with it in mind as a theme.  Each of the five or six main male characters in the book have their own version of manhood, even if they have trouble living up to it. A couple of the characters have significant problems with their own expectations of themselves in this regard, as well as their perceptions of what others might expect of them.

Well - now I am going to have to go back through the draft with this notion in mind, and see what else needs to be addressed.  Is this going to take me into another gloomy valley, or another sunny upland?  On the road again........

Unravelling

I have not been on holidays, as the lack of recent posts on this blog might lead you to suspect - if I had, then posts with pictures of surf, sunshine, and fish, would have been popping up. I have been busy providing support as various family members deal with the fraying and unravelling of some of the threads of the tapestry of their lives.  Stories have ended, and been lost, and threads have broken beyond repair, remaining only in memory.

It has been a difficult, trying time for some of them, and providing support has meant letting some of my routines slip - but that is life.  No amount of planning can identify the exact time and place when certain contingencies will pounce on us, even when the general form and likelyhood of such events is anticipated long in advance.

As the family have moved through the various emergencies and emerged at new balance points, I have been able once again to find time to write.  The journal came first, of course, as I needed to record and make sense of the things that were happening around me. As a degree of normality returned, I was able to once again address the final scenes of my current attempt at a novel - though that was simmering all the while at the back of my mind, and may even have benefited from the process of fermentation. 

A couple of days ago I was able to declare the first draft complete - the first time I have attempted a full length novel and reached a conclusion that I found satisfactory.  Short stories have always felt easier - the ingredients for the ending or the punch line are usually present in the opening lines or paragraphs.  The threads are fewer, and the weave, though it can be complex, does not have the potential for tangles that a few hundred pages can hold.  Short stories can be knotty, but novels can develop dreadlocks - combing them out can be so painful that the only option is run the clippers over it and start afresh.

Already I am building a mental file of the knots that need undoing or cutting, the trimming and polishing that has to happen to make a draft into a novel, and finding the idea of working on the second draft appealing.  Does that mean I am on the right road to completion?  I hope so, because the concept, characters, and scenes for another novel are already trying to get my attention.  Topical as those concepts and characters are, I need to get started soon.

Tonight looks like being the first in a few days not to be illuminated by lightning storms, so, as I doze off, thinking about my stories, I hope to be soothed by the murmur of the creek that has been refreshed by those storms, and the cheerful calls of the frogs and crickets enlivened by the rain and the rising waters.

Round Each New Corner....

The road goes ever on and on, said the Hobbit, and thus it is also with work in the garden.  As you near the end of one stretch of edging, weeding, or pruning, another space presents itself to the eyes and wakens the imagination, as it asks you to attend to its particular needs or potentials.

Spade an edge clear of twisting, burrowing tendrils of grass, making a clean border twixt lawn and garden, and the neat line of fresh soil calls attention to the weeds lurking between favoured plants, or highlights the dying tussocks that now slump down across next winter's daffodils and next spring's irises.

Though the spade in your hand still has more work to do, other tools are calling - hoe, weeder, secateurs, and rake, all crying out for their chance in the sun.  A bare patch of soil is begging for a cutting, seedling or rhizome from some other, overcrowded corner of the garden.  Perhaps the shade that covers that bare patch says violets, or the bright sunlight asks for a daisy or gazania. 

A newly mowed lawn makes even a slightly dishevelled herb or flower bed look like the proverbial sore thumb - though a wind such as the one that galloped through the Blue Mountains last night and this morning will soon cover such distinctions in a carpet of tattered leaves and torn twigs, and the grass rake will stand up eagerly, hoping for employment.  And so the work begins anew - and all the while the words are gathering in an unused corner of your mind, preparing to leap onto the page when you return to your desk.

For me, the routine work of the garden - be that garden a few square metres next to the house, or a few acres of squarely spaced watermelon or pumpkin vines unfurling their first large leaves towards the sun - is a meditative time in which my mind can wander far and wide across memories both past and future, undisturbed by the demands of society. 

Characters long forgotten, or newly created, can act out their parts on the broad stage of our imagination, unfettered by mere reality, while the hoe continues inflicting its routine, repetitive destruction on the weeds that have dared colonise the territories around these favoured plants of mine.

Misplaced Omniscience

Living in the moment - it is what we do, even when our thoughts are drifting back over past events, or trying to envisage or shape possible futures.  How much do we know, in this moment, of the infinite previous moments that have helped build and shape the present we live in?  We certainly cannot know our future, and can do no more than estimate possible futures.

As an author, we are, in effect, God - we know everything that each of our imaginary characters does not know, or knows only partially - we can reach out to any point in the time line of our story and amend acts, thoughts, words, and emotions, and bring to our story the logical consistency that the reader expects from us.

I could ask why the readers, in the face of the many apparently random facts and logical inconsistencies of their own lives, expect me, a mere scribbler, to produce a mini-universe that is consistent and logical, but that would be so hypocritical, given the similar demands that I have placed on so many other authors over the decades.  To be fair, I also find myself expecting such consistency and logic from my political representatives - and look how often that comes to fruition.

So, expect it, we do - thus, when working your way through that crucial second draft, keep in mind that spelling and grammar errors are possibly the least of the problems you need to be alert to.  Your editor, with pedantic eye and punishing pen, will find those, should you travel that far.

No, what you need to beware of are those leakages from your omniscient, authorial knowledge to the limited understandings held by your characters.  It is something I am constantly on watch for, as it is so easy to allow the protagonist to know something that he/she should not - at least, not at this point in the story.

I don't know about the rest of you, but I find that I need to be especially vigilant for this problem as I slide back and forth along the time line of the story I am working on.  Does anyone have an easy, guaranteed method of avoiding this sort of mistake?

If a picture paints a thousand words....

If a picture paints a thousand words, how few words can I use to describe succinctly the beauty in an image such as this?

White sunlight shattered and scattered into its rainbow parts, reflecting from blood red Waratah blossoms, framed by translucent copper sprouting along a plum twig, amid shadow-dappled, chlorophyll-glossed leaves breathing verdant life and beauty into the garden.

See how that flower calls to the eye, even from a distance, surrounded and almost hidden by a tangled quilt of branches, twigs, leaves, needles, and shadows.  It wants to be seen, no matter how thoroughly the other plants may try to conceal it.  Such beauty cries out for a story, and I have encountered several stories explaining the vivid colour of the Waratah.

In one, the flower - once white - is stained red with the blood of a Wonga Pigeon that is wounded by a hawk while seeking its mate.  In another, the red is given to the flower by the blood of a Black Snake that is wounded defending a human child of its totem - while a third story has the flower coloured red by a fiery cataclysm of falling stars.

How old are such stories?  For how long have our ancestors being weaving words to pass on to their descendants the stories of the beauty of the world we all live in?  What is it that drives us to record and describe the world we see - to pass our observations on to those far away in space and time? 

What exactly were they trying to tell us with those stories?

Now cameras are now ubiquitous, and many people use pictures with minimal captions or no words at all, allowing the picture to tell the story or ask the question.  Are cameras displacing descriptive writing?  Often, yes - or so it seems.  But what does a picture tell us if there is no story accompanying it, or embedded in it, meshing into a wider culture that the viewer knows and understands?

Before cameras there were other images - before written or printed words, there were images - paintings on cave walls, carvings, images on wood or clay or stone or bark - representations to assist in the remembering and telling of stories.  Such methods are still in use, and just as DVDs failed to eliminate vinyl records from the world, and ebooks have had to live along side the paper-leaved books they were supposed to be replacing, modern technology will not eliminate our need to create images with our hands and our tongues.

For, in the end, what do we have with which to show others that we were here, thinking and feeling and loving, but the images we offer in the words we speak or sign, or the images we scratch or draw or paint? And will they understand what we offered them?

Rainy Day Reading

Wet weather, as well as helping the garden, provides a wonderful excuse for settling somewhere dry and comfortable, and reading.  This month I indulged in a couple of works about great writers who are no longer with us, and one by another very successful author who is still at it.

As my current "major work" in progress is a crime/thriller, the appearance of "The Lost Detective: Becoming Dashiell Hammett" at the returns desk was just too tempting, and I just had to borrow it. 

Whether you are intending to write crime stories or not, this is a worthwhile read - his well known contemporary, Raymond Chandler, described Hammett as "the ace performer".

Nathan Ward takes us deeply into the life of this great writer, and the swirling, chaotic life of the United States during the first four decades of the twentieth century - he shows us a man with deep flaws, incredible determination and persistance in the face of dreadful setbacks, and amazing story-telling abilities.

He also takes us into the murky world of US politics at a time when organized labour movements were engaged in frequent, often violent, conflict with employers. Hammett's brief experiences as an operative with the Pinkerton Agency are a real eye-opener, and left him deeply disillusioned with many aspects of society, authority, and politics.  It gave me, as an Australian, a deeper understanding of the reasons behind the way many crime-writers have portrayed authority figures in the US.

Another slim volume - "No Time to Spare" by Ursula K Le Guin - is a collection of excerpts from her blog, and was published shortly before her death.  Not much I can say about it other than it is really worth a read. 

She was a great writer, her blogging - taken up late in life, with a certain degree of reluctance - is fascinating, and whether you are an aspiring writer, or simply a lover of her work, this is worth a look.  It even gave this Non-Cat Person some new and interesting insights into the life and thought processes of cats.  To my children and step-children - this is not a request for a kitten, ok?

For those who are aspiring writers, including those who may turn their nose up at his work, can I also recommend Stephen King's memoir - On Writing?  I enjoyed some of his earlier works, have not read many of his later ones, but this book - another slim volume - is excellent, for many reasons.  The first part is mostly memoir, and even if you feel you do not need or wish to know the story of his life, persist - it meshes deeply with the "how to write" part.  If you skip the first half, you will end up wanting to double back, so take the time up front.

One part of King's book gave me great satisfaction; I have often told people that a novella he wrote early on, using the pseudonym "Richard Bachman" and called "The Long Walk"was his best piece - I was tickled to find him declaring that he too regarded it as his finest work.

Am I Seeing it Right?

Does art imitate life, or does life imitate art?  An oft asked question, but the apparent assumption is surely wrong - that one might be true does not mean the other must be false.  Why did I even ask the question?

Yep - I'm once again lost in the pages of an interesting book, one that began simply enough but soon began to reveal layers of interwoven complexity that had me questioning my own perceptions - not only of the words I was reading, but of memory, understanding, and my experiences with life and other people.

My encounter with The Menagerie of False Truths developed from a simple beginning that soon took on twists and turns that echo its contents.  Awake before dawn, and not wanting to disturb a sleeping household, I often put earplugs in and turn on my tiny pocket radio.  At 5 am on most Saturdays of the year, the ABC Sydney station, as well as the one on the Central Coast, broadcast a show called The Big Fish.

The name, and even the promotional material, imply a show that might largely be a one hour fishing report from various correspondents around New South Wales, when in fact it is a radio stage, across which parade a remarkable array of characters, who tell fascinating, informative, and (mostly) amusing stories about people, fish, nature, weather, and, sometimes, politics.

This particular morning I tuned in a bit late, and found myself listening to the host, Scott Levi, questioning a chap about some exotic location in which he had been fishing for trout.  The speaker, eventually identified as Greg French, was articulate and erudite, and it became apparent that he had written a number of books.  A casual angler myself, I had not previously encountered his work - audio or published - and made a mental note to check the catalogue of my local library to see if we held anything by him.

We did, though we are not yet in possession of his latest book - Water Colour - but held other items by him, including "Menagerie"  It was a title strange enough to pique my curiosity, and I ordered it sent up from the branch at which it had been reposing.

It swirls, as the pages turn, from disturbing, to amusing, to tragic, and back to disturbing, all the while informing as well as questioning.  French touches on - digs into - aspects of perception and mis-perception, understanding and mis-understanding, ability and its lack, art, life, arrogance, humility, love, anger, grief, and suffering.

Each new understanding, though, came with an awareness that there must have been much more that I had missed - a re-reading will be in order, along with diversions to investigate concepts and information previously unmet.

At the heart of this novel are the perceptions, understandings, and behaviour that arise from the differences of mind and thought that society refers to as Autism, or The Spectrum, and the effects that those differences send to ripple out through families and communities that surround such  people.  It can be too easy to forget that each of us has a particular way of perceiving and understanding the world around us, and that of course affects our responses to the world and the life in it, including other people - what we see and hear may well be quite different to what they see and hear and feel.

Like fingerprints, each world view has its own unique whorls and curls and patterns - fingerprints, like world views, are meant to help us get a grip on the world around us; each pattern, though unique, still does its job, though some do not fit their surroundings as well as others.

The world we live in is complex, from micro to macro, beyond our ability to fully understand - but understanding it is a journey worth taking. Surprises are guaranteed, but so is delight.

Oh, the Power

What wonderful. god-like powers the writer possesses!  How amazing is it to be able, when some plot point becomes necessary to the continuation of the story, to be able to put it in place and then reach back down the time line of your work and insert the words and sentences that will make that plot point fit seemlessly into the suspended disbelief of the future readers.

The painter will need to paint over existing brush work to add some item or structure to support the new idea, and the sketcher will perhaps combine the eraser with overdrawing - but the underlying original marks are still there for the sharp-eyed. 

The writer can miraculously delete, cut and paste, copy and paste, and insert, at will.  If she is careful, those future readers will never detect even the faintest clue that the author was at any time less than omniscient.  As a child, I took from the instructions of my teachers the idea that somehow the words flowing onto the page had to be the words that would be there for the reader.  It was some time before I understood that was not the case - that I could write what I pleased, and screw it up and use only a few words or sentences from that page to start anew on a clean sheet.

Now I revel in that power - my pen can charge along a line of narrative or conversation as it flows from brain to nerves to fingers to ink, never pausing until it is done.  I can worry about the fine detail, the justifications, the cause and effect, the wit and humour, the pathos and tears, and the believability, later - because I have The Power to Amend, Insert, or Erase, and I'm not afraid to use it.

How to Get Things Done

Is winter closing in before you've built a woodheap sufficient for your needs?  Are your onion seedlings drowning in a sea of chickweed?  Are your grapevines and fruit trees threatening to welcome spring before you've wielded the secateurs?  Is your chimney holding less smoke than your living room?  Is your "To Do" list growing faster than your "Done" list?

Never fear - the answer is here.  In one simple step, the solution to all these problems is at hand.  All you need to do is sit down at the table for half an hour, pen poised over paper, and commence the novel that has been lurking within you for so long.

At the end of half an hour, put pen and paper down and promise yourself that, now you have begun, you will return to the task tomorrow, full of diligence and enthusiasm.  Before you know it, the publisher will be writing the cheque, and your masterpiece will be gracing the windows of every bookshop, just in time for the Christmas rush.

Or that, at least, is the plan - instead, by tomorrow evening, the gardens will be free of weeds; by the end of the week, not only will the pruning be complete, but there will be a row of pots on the bench by the garden shed, each with its carefully trimmed cutting in place, ready to add to the garden next summer.  By Sunday afternoon, the firewood will be stacked so high and so neatly that people will begin asking if you are setting up a wood-selling business.

"No time for that" you will say "I have to finish my novel" and you will set off for your study - with a minor detour to the landscaping yard to buy the pavers with which to construct that path you promised to build ten years ago.  It is truly remarkable how much can be acheived when that novel is lurking in the shadows - but, look, is that a wobbly tread on the back steps?  If I'm quick I can get to the timber yard before they close, and then I will be able to start preplacing that tread first thing tomorrow - or, at least, after I catch up with mowing the lawns.

And yet, it is remarkable what can be achieved when the pen is taken up again, and that first ink is spidered across the page - why is it so often so difficultto get started?  Oh, look, there's that runner I bought months ago to replace the broken one on my beach fishing rod.

Tortoise and Hare

When our little group of writers meet to share ideas and practice our craft, we often use "prompt based" exercises to get the creativity moving.  A word, a phrase, a setting, or an object - or several of each - is placed on the table and the a timer is set running.  The pens and pencils set off in hot pursuit and, after fifteen or twenty minutes has passed, an end is reached.

An end, I say, because that's where we stop, even though the finish that each writer was aiming at, if indeed they knew for certain what their target was, might have needed many more minutes or hours to achieve.  After a brief examination of each work by the group, another prompt is chosen, and the race begins anew.  I tend to leave these sessions in an uplifted and enthusiastic mood.  I seem to be one of those people who finds it easier to begin a work with some costraints in place - such as theme, setting, and a time limit for completion. 

I also leave with a collection of short pieces that need further work - sometimes they merely need tidying up, but more often the ending has to be written, and the middle properly fleshed out.  Then, of course, the beginning will often need a bit of a re-write as well.  Occasionally, I find myself with a page or two that could turn into much more than a short story.

Some teachers of writing insist that this is the best way to write - pick up the pen and set out on the journey, never looking back until the destination is reached, and only then commence the task of perfecting the work.

Is it better to rush forward, spilling words across the paper until the conclusion has been attained, and then go back to begin the painstaking review and reconstruction of paragraphs and chapters - or to shape each word, phrase, sentence, and paragraph into a perfect form before moving onto the next?

Is that even possible if the writer does not yet know the ending?

For the writer, though God of the Universe that is flowing from the Authorial Pen, is not - cannot be- Omniscient until the final word is on the page, and the new universe has taken its full shape.  Only then can the true relevance and aptness of each word and phrase be known.

Others advise that, instead of reviewing and reworking, the author take the first draft and hurl it into the fire, before starting afresh and producing a new body of work from the ghost of the old. Finding the "best way" to write is a question that is always lurking in the background - whether I am at my desk or not.

I recently read Annie Dillard's "The Writing Life"  In it, she examines the alternatives, and gives reasons why each method is good, without selecting one above the others - which left me wondering if Professor Tolkien had been having a dig at teachers of writing when he had Frodo say "And it is also said, 'Go not to the elves for counsel, for they will say both no and yes.'"

I will just have to keep wondering, I guess - and keep that pen scratching across the page while I do so.

The Long Goodbye - or How Things Stay the Same

Raymond Chandler's novel The Long Goodbye - published in 1953 and set in the previous few years, contains substantial amounts of social criticism - something writers are warned against doing by publishers and creative writing advisors.

Yet Chandler has woven it into the story deftly, in mostly small doses, as part of conversations and descriptions that fit neatly in with the action and the characters. 

One passage that caught my eye in particular was a monologue from the extremely wealthy Mr Potter to the hero, Philip Marlowe, set out below......

"There's a peculiar thing about money" he went on "In large quantities it tends to have a life of its own, even a conscience of its own.  The power of money becomes very difficult to control.  Man has always been a venal animal.  The growth of populations, the huge cost of wars, the incessant pressure of confiscatory taxation - all these things make him more and more venal.  The average man is tired and scared, and a tired, scared man can't afford ideals.  He has to buy food for his family.  In our time we have seen a shocking decline in both public and private morals.  You can't expect quality from people whose lives are a subjection to a lack of quality.  You can't have quality with mass production.  You don't want it because it lasts too long.  So you substitute styling, which is a commercial swindle intended to produce artificial obsolescence.  Mass production couldn't sell its goods next year unless it made what it sold this year look unfashionable a year from now.  We have the whitest kitchens and the most shining bathrooms in the world.  But in the lovely white kitchen the average American housewife can't produce a meal fit to eat, and the lovely shining bathroom is mostly a receptacle for deodorants, laxatives, sleeping pills, and the products of that confidence racket called the cosmetic industry.  We make the finest packages in the world, Mr Marlowe.  The stuff inside is mostly junk."

As Chandler wrote and published this novel that included many critiques of American society, especially of the wealthy parts of that society, Ayn Rand was busy compiling her longest and most controversial work, Atlas Shrugged - a work that in so many ways opposed what Chandler was saying about the root causes of societal problems of the day; problems that were with us long before he wrote, and that continue to plague us today.

In Mr Potter, Chandler has managed to introduce us to a man who, while not the real villain of the book, still imposes his own warped agenda on the other characters, and is Randian in his ability to set out many of the problems of society while not quite coming to grips with the real causes of what he has perceived, nor with his own part in the forming of those problems.

Being a child of the times during which this book was published, I was surprised by the extent of the cynicism and world-weariness of so many of the characters in this novel.  After all, was not this the beginning of the new golden age of peace and modernity that had been ushered in by the great victory against fascism? 

It seemed to me, as the Fifties folded into the Sixties, that it was a golden time, despite the dark threats the cold war from time to time imposed upon my awareness.  But if it was so golden, why did Philip Marlowe resonate so strongly with so many readers?  And why does it feel as if nothing much has changed?

A Matter of Appearance

There has been some discussion in the media and online about the way some male writers depict female characters in their books, particularly those men who seem to focus - in a teenage boy sort of way - on the breasts and figure of the character, as well as using descriptions of figure, face, and clothing, to imply sexual availability or inclination.

This article in the Guardian is a case in point https://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2018/apr/03/male-authors-write-female-characters-twitter

The Guardian article particularly highlights the way some male writers have their female characters dwelling on - for example - their own breasts or legs or hips, but in a way that is obviously from their own male perspective of what is attractive in a woman.  In essence, projecting their own feelings into the female character.

It made me wonder about the way I describe the physical attributes of characters, so I opened up the first chapter of the novel I am working on.  A quick read showed that I had put very little direct physical descriptions of characters into the work, and certainly have not indulged in that behaviour some call an "all points bulletin" - that top to toe, point by point itemisation of height and weight, skin and hair, that can so derail the flow of the story. 

This could, in some ways, be a good thing, as too often a writer can end up displaying more about his own prejudices than actually helping the reader understand the character and why the story is progressing as it is.  On the other hand, how little physical description can an author provide and still engage the imagination of the reader?

The question seems to be, what physical characteristics are important for the development of the plot/story etc and how might those aspects bring about reactions or behaviour from the other characters in the book or story?  I asked a writerly friend - one who is actually selling books - what she thought was the appropriate amount of description.

My friend offered the opinion that description is good as long as it adds to the story - but that there should be plenty of room for the reader to insert their own images of the characters, including imagining themselves into the position of the heroine (or hero)  - this relates to the romance novel that she is successfully selling at the moment - the hero gets a reasonably thorough description; after all, he has to be attractive, but even then she leaves leeway for the reader to apply their own preferred characteristics to the love object.

Yet some authors insist on dictating the physical attributes of the characters - often going into bullet point descriptions of the person, with extrapolation from certain of the attributes and how they are displayed or how they are thought of by the character, to indicate the character's feelings towards the hero or other people.

So, how much physical description of a character is needed to satisfy the reader?  For another opinion, I pulled out a few of the classic novels of various genres, and found quite a variety of approaches.  Some hardly say anything, while others offer half a page of physical detail for each character.

It is a vexed question, but an important one - for it is well established that we humans have a habit of looking at other humans, and quickly coming to conclusions about their character and honesty based on the first impressions garnered from that initial glance. 

We take in their height, gender, skin and hair colour, and hair-do, clothing (style and cleanliness), and footwear - and very quickly process that information through the filters of our past experience and prejudices (we all have plenty of both).  It is rarely done in a careful, conscious, item by item way - instead, it is a judgement based on a glance. 

At times, if the judgement is intense, we have a sudden sense that we have detected a good or bad "vibe" around the newcomer.  We can even take an instant dislike to that person, or fall head over heels in love (or lust - they are both four letter words that start with 'l' and can both get us in considerable trouble) - and it is not just authors dealing with this problem; vast reams of paper have been dedicated to the musings of scientists trying to understand this troubling aspect of human behaviour.

That suggests that when we write a phrase describing one character, we are doing it for two sets of people - our readers, and our fictional characters in the novel.  The reactions of the latter to the appearance of a new character can have a material effect on decisions and actions yet to be taken by the characters already on the page.  What one character says or thinks about some aspect of the appearance of another character can tell the reader so much about what has happened, and what might be going to happen as the story unfolds.

Le Carre tells gives the reader a strong description George Smiley while also, in a paragraph, letting us know what people around him think and feel about him.......

Short, fat, and of a quiet disposition, he appeared to spend a lot of money on really bad clothes, which hung about his squat frame like skin on a shrunken toad. Sawley, in fact, declared at the wedding that ‘Sercomb was mated to a bullfrog in a sou’wester’. And Smiley, unaware of this description, had waddled down the aisle in search of the kiss that would turn him into a Prince.

Lee Child lets us know why the other characters in his books might be intimidated by Jack Reacher....

“His lazy lopsided grin. His tousled hair. His arms, so long they gave him a greyhound’s grace even though he was built like the side of a house. His eyes, cold icy blue like the Arctic. His hands, giant battered mitts that bunched into fists the size of footballs.”

Likewise, Bernard Cornwell makes sure early on that the reader can see the image of a tall, strong, scarred and battered man with eyes that have seen and survived much violence, and will not flinch at more.

But then there are the often sardonic descriptions offered by the thoughts and words of Chandler's battered private detective, Phillip Marlowe - his opening, self-description tells us not only what he looks like, but how he feels about himself and the world around him.....

“It was about eleven o'clock in the morning, mid October, with the sun not shining and a look of hard wet rain in the clearness of the foothills. I was wearing my powder-blue suit, with dark blue shirt, tie and display handkerchief, black brogues, black wool socks with dark little clocks on them. I was neat, clean, shaved and sober, and I didn't care who knew it. I was everything the well-dressed private detective ought to be. I was calling on four million dollars.” 

I haven't answered my own question, have I?  The best an author can do is what feels right as the words fall to the page - and perhaps we should not worry too much, because, no doubt, an editor is waiting, red pen poised, to correct us if we get it wrong.

Flat Spots

What do you do when a writing "Flat Spot" deepens into a trough of unproductive days, and then begins to stretch into an arid plain of empty pages?  Why does it happen in the first place?

There is plenty of advice about the importance and value of "turning up" and of keeping to a routine as ways to ensure writing success.  Daily life, though, can throw up legitimate obstacles to the writing life - first one, then another, so that flat spot happens, and pages remain blank.  A prior commitment here, or an illness there, and two or three non-writing days have stretched to a week.

There is a point during that week where guilt begins to nibble at the edge of the mind - promises made to one's self have been left unfulfilled - and even though each distracted day was so for a valid reason, that guilt goes from a mound that trips the writer up, to a mountain that looks too high to even attempt to climb.

Standing on the edge of that plain of empty pages, the mountain of guilt and self-accusations looming ahead, is a lonely place to be, it seems - but it is far from a unique position to be in.  There have been plenty of words written on that very topic, such as this blog post by Emily Temple, in which she examines the diary entries of famous writers who were published before their flat spots, and after, but had moments where all seemed lost.

What to do about it?  This article in The New Yorker, by Ferris Jabr, is a nice summary of the value of such a simple solution as going for a walk, while this blog post by Nicole L'autore explores other ways to regain your writing momentum.  Some of Nicole's suggestions do fit on the list of things I do to procrastinate, but others definitely seem worth a try.

In this case, it seems that writing about the reasons I have not been writing was enough to get the words flowing again - and that reminds me of the concept of morning words (another thing I have been less than scrupulous about, lately).  Julia Cameron, in The Artist's Way, seems to be the source for this idea, and she made the point that it really didn't matter what the words were, as long as they were allowed to flow from brain to pen to paper.  Those words might be, at their start, a litany of complaints or excuses, but once they are on the paper, there is room in the brain for the other words to come to the fore - and doesn't that feel better?

Touching Rules

Rules, said Douglas Bader
Are for the Guidance of the Wise
And the Obedience of Fools

Self Praise, Lord Byron cried,
Is No Praise at all.
(The Empty Vessel the Most Noise makes, my mother said)

The Fool doth think he is wise,
The Jester said, but the Wise Man
Knows Himself to be a Fool.

Should Obedience be our Touchstone, or
Is Disobedience Wise?  Who makes the rules,
And, Why?



Who makes the rules, indeed, and why?  Are the rules set in stone, or are they merely a touchstone with which to assay the worth of our work?  Guidance or obediance - how important are the rules?

Mostly, I suspect, rules were made because they seemed to work - to produce the best results, as judged by the standards of the time and place in which they were made.  Spelling and grammar rules give certitude to transmission of meaning from author to reader, it is believed.

Mostly, again, this is true - particularly when the meaning being transmitted can be accurately and precisely defined, as in the case of manuals and text books - but where would poetry and literature be without all the great rule-breakers?  Shakespeare's writings would have been so much poorer if he had stuck to "the rules" that existed at the beginning of his career.  No doubt he understood the language well enough to do amazing things with it as it stood, but he also knew how to change and add to it, and did so in ways that affected all English speaking writers afterwards.

Likewise Lewis Carroll and his Jabberwock - if he had stuck to the rules and canon of his time, would The Goon Show or Monty Python have emerged?  What about James Joyce, or Jack Kerouac - what would their thoughts have looked like if written down strictly according to the rules of grammar as then applicable?

On the other hand, Hemmingway, Greene, Le Carre, Christie, or Child are scrupulous in their observance of linguistic norms, but have succeeded in turning out highly regarded and widely read work - it's a fine line between the pleasure and displeasure of the editor's audit.

How can we know if we are writing wisely or foolishly?  Anne R. Allen addresses that question in her blog post The Rules of Writing.... and Why not to Follow Them, but, in the end, it might come down to as simple a question as "Are you enjoying what you just wrote"?

When you read it out loud, does it move you?  Do the creepy bits send a shiver up your spine?  Do you smile at the happy parts, or do those words take you once again to a beautiful place you knew, long ago?  Is a tear welling in the corner of your eye as you read that paragraph about a lost love?

The rules are worth knowing, there is no doubting that - just as there  is no doubting the value in stepping onto the road less travelled to see where it leads you; if the destination isn't what you hoped for, then try another track - serendipity is waiting for you, somewhere around the bend.

Writing Rainbows

That famous tapestry The Lady and The Unicorn has travelled from France to Sydney, and it made me ask myself, what coloured threads would my stories add to the great tapestry of human history?

What colour is tragedy, or triumph?  What about the Bayeux Tapestry?  It contains a great deal of both in its 70 metres of embroidered history.  Is green really the colour of envy, or is it the colour of life?  Are The Blues really sad, or should we turn to black to express real unhappiness?  When you read a sentence or a paragraph, does it bring a sense of a particular colour?

What about love; is it the lolly pink of Valentine's Day cards and frilly, sequinned tutus worn by four year olds?  Or is it some darker shade and hue?  No matter now separate or independent we think we are, the stories we live and tell are all tinted by the stories around us, and those that came before.

Do you have, for example, a sense of darkness when listening to the news?  Is it a looming blackness, or a dull grey mist at the edge of perception?  Does the air take on a golden tinge when you hear good news, or some tale of heroism or beauty?

A well written passage can invoke, without actually specifying, a range of colours, as well as moods and scents and sounds.  Not only the words used, but the tempo and rhythm also.  A good example is found in the closing pages of chapter 5 of Book 5 of The Lord of The Rings.  Tolkien's choice of words invokes gloom, fear, darkness, and hopelessness - the tempo of the language slows, and weighs down upon the reader, before, suddenly, the last few paragraphs completely change rhythm.  There is brightness and speed and hope.  Read the last two or three pages aloud and it will become apparent - not only the mood changes, but the colours.

Norman Lindsay is worth reading, too - did you know that he wrote quite a few novels?  The artist's eye is evident in his choice of words for both description and action - always evoking the colour and tone of the setting and the actors.  The first chapter or Dust or Polish  contains this part description of one of the protagonists.....

"Her skin was of a pearly quality that showed up the refined etching of her amber eyebrows"

Lindsay's style is plainer than Tolkien's, who would vary his tone from common speech to high epic mode to suit the particular characters and action he was writing at that point.  Lindsay's work is all set firmly in lower and middle class Australia in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, and captures the tone of that part of our country and its history quite well.

Continuing in the Australian voice, another book worth reading is Green Mountains and Cullenbenbong by Bernard O'Reilly - the man who found the survivors from the missing airliner in the McPherson Range in early 1937.  As a bushman who grew up observing the life of the Blue Mountains and the Kanimbla Valley, O'Reilly uses colour to set the scene and the mood, as here, on the first page.....

"On Wednesday, 17th February 1937, day broke sullenly without the usual rich reds and browns which attend a Queensland mountain sunrise.  A pale grey scum had spread itself over the sky from the sea...."

What about the opening lines of The Grapes of Wrath - Steinbeck.....

"To the red country and part of the grey country of Oklahoma the last rains came gently, and they did not cut the scarred earth.  The ploughs crossed and recrossed the rivulet marks.  The last rains lifted the corn quickly.....    .... so that the grey country and the dark red country began to disappear under a green cover."

Simpler language, and shorter words and rhythms than either Tolkien or Lindsay, but Steinbeck was setting the scene for the stark and unrelenting disaster of the Dust Bowl.  In the first page, the colours change, and change again, reflecting the course of the seasons that led to the Okie migration.  By the end of the page, all is pale dust.

Reading these works aloud is the best way to experience the craft that each writer put onto the page, just as it is the best way to proof read and assess your own writing. An interesting experiment in that respect is to ask someone else to read your work to you, and see what tempo and colour they apply to it.