(no subject)

I promised lnhammer that I would post about The Arrival's reception by my Wednesday class. I fell asleep instead. I taught, then I slept, then I forgot dinner (which I'd already prepared) and then I went to a meeting. I shall eat that dinner tonight (brunch today was hot dogs made with halal herbed sausages, with cos lettuce replacing the bread and with spicy sauce - I'm finishing up things in the freezer and my next purchase will be the food the doctor wants me to eat).

The Arrival totally derailed the class. Every single person wanted to spend lots of time on it.

I taught round it. I divided people up into small groups and I taught them all at different rates. I managed to get through all the planned stuff except one (iambic pentameters will have to wait till next week) and our story-of-the-day was Arthur dying and the sword being thrown back into the lake. My students loved that bit of Arthuriana even more than they loved the sword in the stone.

This increase in Arthurian love is largely because I lost it in a particuarly Gillianish way. Trying to keep track of the book and working with everyone's responses wasn't so straightforward yesterday. The class was ten students strong, and they all had things to say. Two of the students adopted little boy mode - poking at each other's books with their pens to force them off the table, calling each other names. They were the students sitting closest to me, of course. They weren't disruptive, but it was another factor in an interesting session. [I told them they were suddenly much younger than I had thought (it's an adult class), and made them write about each other with evil intent.]

Anyhow, when I lose it Gillianishly, I lose respect and courtesy and politeness. I'm afraid not a single one of the ten will take Arthur worrying about Excalibur being returned to the Lady of the Lake seriously. Ever.

The big thing I learned from it all was that telling stories to a live audience with no cheat sheets is a brilliant way of making sure that your narrative style works. I must do it again and again and again. (In fact, my classs now asks for a story every week, so what I really need to do is find new audiences.) I broke all sort of 'rules' yesterday and had people laughing the whole way. And the best lines for the reader aren't necessarily the prettiest lines. In fact, the best line yesterday (I had to stop and wait before I could continue.) was "You've hidden it under a bush, haven't you?"

Every week I find that I have extras in the class. They're not actually part of the class. They don't want to do the writing. They do, however, sit in the lounge area or play on the computer and occasionally add their 6d worth to discussion. I've taken to judging some of the story component by them.

My proper students will write away the minute I'm finished and will ask "Can I do more of this for homework?"

"I've already given you homework?"

"Can I do this as well?"

These other people, though, are attracted by the story itself, not what can be done with the story.

Even more reasons why my Wednesday class is the best thing since sliced bread.

I have a litle bit of news. Later in the year I'm to be a guest speaker in an aged care facility. The organiser said "You can read several of your poems."

"Actually," I said, "I write novels. I really don't think you want me to read several of them. How about I talk about the one I've been working on, which is has elderly women as the heroines."

She loved that idea. What I shall do, I think, is talk about the research and what my focus groups told me about their childhoods and movie habits. Then I'll read segments about each of the two over 75s. An editor just wrote me a nice note saying how much she liked that novel but that I should really position it for teens. I guess I need to find a new editor willing to take a gander, but right now the health makes it difficult.

(no subject)

I've decided I don't have any secret projects or even sekrit projects. This is because so many people in my vicinity are talking about secret/sekrit projects.

When all these projects began not being announced, I found it entertaining. I wondered what each project could be. I speculated. I waited for the next bulletin. All the next bulletins told me were "I did lots of work." I was ready and waiting for interesting bits and alas, there were none. No funny stories. No sadness. No tremendous joy. In fact, no detail at all.

Now I've reached the stage where, if I can't hear any interesting bits, I'd rather not know. Five people talking about the mega-work they've been putting in on their secret/sekrit project got me to this position. That's not five in total. That's five in the last few hours.

I was explaining to someone in my afternoon meeting how good writers tell stories in interesting ways. The trouble with secret/sekrit projects is that some of those projects (maybe all of them) will be delightful stories, told perfectly. The thing is, though, that the way I'm hearing about them isn't delightful. There's no telling detail. The excitement isn't building as it should. And there are a lot of these secrets/sekrits around and some people are blogging and Facebooking at great length and often. I don't even get to share the quirky or the silly. All I heard is how much work was done and how hard it was and that yes, the project is still secret/sekrit.

Yesterday I was all agog to hear secrets. Today I'm over it. I'll rediscover my interest in the projects when they're in print/ebook and I can read them. I'll have to be convinced of their intrinsic interest all over again when that comes, though. My friends have lost me at this point in time.

Just to be fair, I've hidden all my secrets in a safe place. Under a rug somewhere. That means I won't be tempted to talk about them until they crawl out from under that rug on their own. The rug is a Belouchi prayer rug, about 60 years old.