(Walter vs. Stephen) x (James vs. Paul) (2024)
An Algebraic Approach to Dissecting My Writing Style
There is a fight-to-the-pain happening in my office. Whenever I sit down to write, there is a wrassle to the death between four proper gentlemen. A literary scrum. Blood and bone and adverbs everywhere. Now I know what Laura Ingalls Wilder went through. The four men in question aren’t actually murdering each other - and the pain is not theirs. They are, how do I say, fighting in my head - and they are rather, killing my darlings. This is a writer’s term for excising favorite words, sentences, and scenes out of the usable text and onto the garbage-strewn carpet (because: snacks). This editing process - this four-man battle - is brutal and excruciating and mean and rewarding. Language is such a peculiar beast. So many words out there, laying dormant - just waiting to be plucked and gathered. And then - magic. Somehow, interconnecting a series of words that did not previously belong together can bring this odd creature called a writer actual happiness. So much time and thought and effort is placed into linking the words just so - it’s like working with DNA. When the result snaps into place, it is practically a miracle. Hence the term darlings. This is why, when a writer assesses an entire story of these joyous interconnected words, inevitably some of the chains (usually some of the favorite chains - some of the best you’ve ever written) no longer belong in the story - and have to be lopped off. Because every word should serve the story.
How do you know which portions need to be excised? Well, my four men tell me. But, the culprit is normally A.I. No, not Artificial Intelligence (or Insemination). I refer to a term that outdates those suckerpunk monkeychumps by a century: the dreaded Author Intrusion. This is when a writer infuses something he or she really wants to say into the writing (or a scene they really love), only it comes out of a character or circumstance in which it doesn’t belong. You may not recognize it when you write it, but you recognize it when you see it. In other words, you - as an audience - are really into that great movie. You’re totally leaning in. Suddenly, a character says something that feels off. You lean back. You remember you’re watching a movie. You look at your watch. You’re no longer lost to the reality, and you can’t put a pin in why. But, THIS is why. Somebody said something or did something the character simply would not say or do. You noticed, and remembered, oh, it’s just a movie. The five saddest words in the universe next to that’s cauliflower not ice cream.
And people - it is so important that you NOT remember that it is just a movie. Why? (And I state this manifesto as it applies to the written word, motion picture, live performance, music - any art, really) Because the story is meant to change you. That’s right. Real art. Great art (and wildly entertaining rides can certainly be great art) is intended to be a forest that folds-in once entered. That, if crafted well, you will do ONE THING NOW and ANOTHER THING LATER. The one thing you will do now is that you will SEE YOURSELF in the story. In one or more of the characters. In the situation. In the predicament. And that as you lose yourself into said story and situation and predicament, regardless of how the protagonist handles him or herself, you are constantly negotiating in your imagination how YOU would respond in that story, situation, and predicament. That is when you do another thing. And that other thing is you SEE YOURSELF DIFFERENTLY. Because of the nature of the way the story unfolds, and because you are completely sucked into said story, you parallel your life experience to it and come out the other side with some ANSWERS to your REAL LIFE! Is this insane? Not at all. Just consider your favorite films, novels, programs, albums and tell me that they haven’t radically shaped your humanity at some time in your life. But, this can only happen if a story is told well - if you are emotionally surrendered to the story. The moment you remember that it’s just a movie, you detach - and it no longer has any impact on your real life.
Why do I say this? Because I believe (and I should because I’m a writer) that creativity isn’t just good. Creativity is life. This is also why I call myself a Creative. It’s not really all that different than a Writer, except that Creatives are changing lives. And Writers are weird.
We are the members of society that you could not find a place for as children. We were the last ones picked if you even noticed us standing there. We were the creeps who were staring, observing everything. You probably told us to get out of your personal space and we kept staring, but with a wicked retort like “go somewhere and die slowly.” In lieu of fists, words were our weapons of choice and we wielded them well (or poorly, depending upon which side of them you stood). We were also super friendly, but in an off-putting way, like we didn’t have first-hand experience what a friend was. That’s because, to a Writer, our whole life has been one damn story - and the ultimate reward/revenge is when everyone finally sees how it ends. See? Weird.
The first inkling I had that I might be a writer was that I was weird. I couldn’t throw the ball like the others and I couldn’t move to the rhythm like the others and I didn’t look like the others, but man, could I keep the guys laughing around the campfire. Spaghetti-out-the-nose laughing. Why did we have spaghetti around the campfire? Poor planning.
This is why I was startled at the age of eight when we were on a lake trip with my maternal Grandfather and I found myself in a rare moment alone with him on his boat, “Mark, my boy,” he barked, startling the hell out of me because an eight-year-old never expects any adult to speak directly to them, “Mark, my boy! What do you dream of being when you get older?” You notice he didn’t say “going to be” or “when you grow up.” My grandfather Charlie was very intentional that way. I barely had to think before my little water-logged eight-year-old voice squeaked, “A writer. I’m gonna be a writer.” It was as if the words were right at the top of my throat, dangling from the uvula, arms sore, waiting for anyone - ANYONE - to finally ask the question. I remember the moment like it was yesterday because a) I couldn’t believe how certain I was and b) I was wearing a life jacket two-sizes too small. What my grandfather said next blows my mind as much today as it did then. He said, “No, you don’t, kid.” I was gobsmacked - until he continued, “You don’t DREAM of being a writer. You already ARE a writer. You’ve been a writer since you first opened your mouth to tell me one of your stories, kid. I’ve always known it - and I’m so glad it’s what you want for yourself.” Right? In all the setbacks I would suffer over the next fifty years (and there would be many), that moment set me on an unbreakable track. From that moment on, I was a writer.
When the boat excursion was over and we arrived back at my Grandfather’s house, he asked me to accompany him into his garage. Off of a high-shelf, he dusted off an old 1950’s ROYAL manual typewriter, covered in cobwebs. He said, “I want you to use this to write your first masterpiece.” I took it home, dusted it off, and started writing. I haven’t stopped since. Afternoons after school, early morning moments of inspiration to deep, deep into the midnight hours. I wasn’t outside throwing the ball. I was in my room - at my desk - tiny fingers blistered punching away at that rusty old typewriter.
As a matter of fact, I logged so many hours typing on that mechanical monster with my two tiny eight-year-old paws that, to this day, I type faster with my two index fingers alone than I do with all ten - and I type pretty damn fast with all ten. My college roommates dubbed me “two-fingered pecker,” a nickname that was oft-misunderstood. I eventually grew away from using that manual typewriter and into an electric, then an electric with memory, then the ever-evolving word processor of a computer. But, from that day to this, no matter where I have found the space to write, there has been one constant. There, on a shelf in that room where I continue to attempt to write a masterpiece, the 1950’s ROYAL manual typewriter that my Grandfather Charlie gave me sits like an icon - reminding me: kid, don’t ever give up.
Thus, I haven’t (given up, that is) - but I have needed to refine my words (back to Author Intrusion) - and quite often. It was Walt Whitman who said “I contain multitudes,” and as a writer, he was not exaggerating. It is our job to call out the honest human experience - but not merely our own - never just a single experience. That wouldn’t be fair. Instead, it is the writer’s glory and burden to somehow figure out how to call out multitudes of the honest human experience. To create indelible and real characters ad infinitum, who cares that we have but one life to call our own? To this end, a writer cannot help but fall in love with his or her ideas - because a writers ideas are PEOPLE. Each and every one is a new friend who understands our special type of Weird. It is both an addiction and a dysfunction that comes with the territory. We say a writer falls in love with words, but this can’t be true because it matters what order the words are in. And when a writer falls in love with the specific order of words so much that he or she cannot bear to excise them, this is what we call Author Intrusion.
Author Intrusion often depends upon the character. For instance, if a doctor character said “that’s why we sing ‘happy birthday’ while we wash our hands - to ward off infection,” it wouldn’t feel strange at all. But, give that same line to Liz Lemon - and you suddenly realize why everyone hated the COVID sitcom reunions. Sometimes, A.I. comes in the form of an author forcing facts into the narrative that no human being would ever say, like “You already know my husband Jeffrey Blanton and our twins Bruce and Sherry Blanton - and I’m Toni Blanton. We are the Blantons.” Other times, it’s as subtle as a character in a period piece reading a novel that you know good and well was written eight years later.
So, each writer understands when something he or she writes make them lean back and disengage from the story, But, how does that writer form a process that helps them recognize and eradicate such content before it is in front of an audience? For me, it is my four wrestling gentlemen.
Why four gentlemen? Because these four men are my creative inspirations. They are lighthouses that mark my journey. Does that mean that I aspire to write or create exactly like any one of them? No - not really. I am vastly entertained by all of them - and they each bring tools to creativity that I embrace, but I find that, at my best, I am the result of an odd science experiment betwixt the four: a wrestling match. They are the four extreme corners of the cube in which my writing bobbles somewhere in the middle. The closer to the center of that cube, the better my ideas - the less Intrusive, rounded up and tethered in by the Four Horseman of My Creativity: Paul, James, Walter, and Stephen.
In the top right corner, there is Walter - as in Walter Elias Disney. Certainly the most celebrated human creative mind in the universe, living or dead - I mean, the man has monorails. But, this isn’t why I admire Walt’s creative mind. It was his ability to access the most childlike part of his adult brain during one of the most depressing eras of human history. While the world was crumbling emotionally, Walt was able to truly harken back deep enough into his psych to create the sorts of fantastical friends and companions that children are still imagining as their best friends today. Walt, for better, or worse, represents the most innocent part of our creativity pushing its way through the callouses of hard life, the desire to see the best characters succeed and the kindest thrive. Of course, these characters were still flawed, imperfect. For every clumsy Bambi, there was a Snow White afraid of trees and a flying elephant who was pretty racist. For all my admiring, I do not want to write like Walt Disney. Not at all. This is why he needs another creative mind to battle inside my imagination.
Walter’s wrestling partner is Stephen - as in King. Known widely as the Master of the Macabre or the King of Horror and Suspense, you wouldn’t know unless you read him as much as I do that King also has an acute radar for the beast inside each of us. His most terrible creations are indeed monstrosities, but not the invented. King is able to - on the precision of a dime - nail the evil men do and craft human characters who embody such terribleness that we as readers are taught to embrace the opposite. Stephen King’s writings are some of the most moral I have ever come across, because they not only make it their business to point our living and treating of one another in the right direction, they terrify us into it. According to King’s narratives, intentionally keeping kindness from another human is an active evil. A significant lesson for us all. In my opinion, King is also a master of the Comedy Release - the moment when a non-comedy has the tension cranked up so high that only a great gag can allow us to breathe again. I love a terrifying yarn. I wish I could write an indelible moment of terror half as well as King does, but I found that I don’t need to. My writing is best when those moments are sparse and unexpected like the Native American woman with the “baby” on her back at the rest stop in “Everest & the Exceptions” or the oily soul pouring out of Robin’s mouth in “oz. of God” or the revelation of who Kathleen truly is in the short story of the same name. I don’t overuse terror in my writings, so when it happens - hopefully, you are startled enough to throw the book across the room. For me, the Stephen has to be constantly wrestling with the Walt: the earnest boy who wants robot dogs and origami monkeys and stone beasts and the very last sandwich in the entire world to inhabit my stories.
Without the childlike spark of treasure maps and electric companions and talking animals, we cannot recall what innocence once tasted like. Without the beasts and demons and haunted humans who wish us pain, we cannot believe that we can overcome the evils that face us daily in the real world. In my stories - my best stories - I crave both. I still yearn for that childlike spark - because that keeps us innocent. I still crave the stuff of nightmares - because that forces us to grow up. I hope Walt and Stephen can hash it out in my office and come up with something worth reading. A story with only a glorious aim in mind is worthless - we also need a terrible thing to defeat.
The more difficult wrestling match in my mind is between James & Paul. James would actually be Jim. As in Jim Henson, creator of the Muppets. And Paul would be Paul Hewson, best known as Bono of the rock band U2. Because Bono brings the bluster and the cool - and the Muppets don’t have a calm-and-collected bone in their colorful bodies. My life - and therefore my writing - is filled with misguided attempts to either be too cool for my own believability - or too insane, too Muppet for my humanity. When I lose control, I am all Muppet - snarfing armfuls of cookies like the monster, slaying the drum kit like Ah-Ni-Mahl, or histrionically panicking YOU TURNED THE PAGE like Grover. When I attempt to wrestle control for myself, I go too far and I am a pretentious parody of cool like Bono’s MacPhisto or The Fly. But, somewhere in-between? Now, that’s the sweet spot. Because in the center of all that - at a measured distance from the insanity and the poseur, but close enough to both to taste them, I get the artful earnestness of Bono phrased with delicious earworm bon mots. I get the bold and audacious inner-scream of the Muppets - the thrilling eye-open speculation of wonder where none of us have any idea where the Electric Mayhem of this story is going to take us. Somewhere in the crosshairs is the real me.
There is one other modern writer who I feel captures that ever-evasive middle-ground. I don’t try to write like him, but I do admire him - and that is J. J. Abrams. As a matter of fact, I was given the opportunity a few years back to meet with some of J. J.’s team at Bad Robot in Santa Monica. Now, you may very well live in Santa Monica and you may very well say to yourself - Self, I know Santa Monica. Every inch of Santa Monica - and there is no Bad Robot in Santa Monica. As a polite retort to such indignation, I would suggest, Of course not - but do you know the National Typewriter Company? It’s an 18,000 sq. ft. refurbished warehouse right down Olympic? You know as you approach the front door that something is afoot as a small sign above a glowing green light reads “are you ready?” That’s Bad Robot. The master of the misdirect, Mr. Abrams even wanted his creative workspace to stupefy the non-stupids. But, the moment you enter that door, you know you are in a creative wonderland. Hand-carved wooden Jedi Chess set, props behind glass adorn the walls from Lost, Alias, Star Trek, Cloverfield, Mission: Impossible III. Abrams own bathroom is hidden behind a secret opening triggered by the pull of a book. It is, in short, a creative’s dream. But, as I entered the space, above all the paraphernalia from some of my favorite entertainment, one item stood out from all the others. There, in the center of the foyer, spotlighted and on a plinth - was my typewriter.
Now, it wasn’t really my typewriter - but it was the EXACT same typewriter - right down to the color, make and year - sitting here in J. J.’s lobby. I was stumped. What were the chances that J. J. and I had precisely the same random typewriter in our workspace - even if it was a prop from one of his films. I approached one of the receptionists, “Excuse me, is there any significance to the Royal manual typewriter?” She responded, “Oh, you mean J.J.’s grandfather’s typewriter?”
Now, to be honest, the rest of the story she proceeded to tell me mushed into a gaping echo as my brain exploded all over my work blazer. The truth is, Abrams greatest influence as a child was his maternal grandfather Harry Kelvin - and this was his typewriter that he passed down to J.J.
I don’t write because it’s easy or because it is the most foolproof way to make a living. Believe me, it is neither. I write because it is life and breath to me - because it is when I feel most inspired - when I feel most in touch with God - when I feel most in touch with my heritage. But, this is only true if I am writing with genuineness. Writing like no one in the world would write except for me. Yes, I have inspirations. Yes, I enjoy dabbling a little into each of their worlds, but our favorites are most importantly guide rails to find ourselves. Remember when I asked about your favorite films, books, albums. Well, they were probably an eclectic bunch. But, I will bet you that if you laid them all down: your Dead Poets Societys and Bravehearts and Shawshank Redemptions and Goodfellas. Your “To Kill a Mockingbird”s and “Infinite Jest”s and “Catchers in the Rye” and “The Stand”s, your Losts and Breaking Bads and Mad Men and Arrested Developments, your “Nevermind”s and “Achtung Baby”s and “Lemonade”s and “folklore”s — if you laid them all down on your floor, you would see yourself. Not in any one of them, but in some delicious amalgamation of all of them with many flavors that you contributed all alone. This is what I discover as I allow my favorites to duke it out in my writing.
As I embrace - and enjoy - the impact Walt vs. Stephen and James vs. Paul have had on my life, I am able to relish what makes me truly unique - and that allows me to set pen to paper (or fingers to keyboard) and write something that will make you lean in. The hope is that you will lean in so hard, you will not be able to help but see yourself - and then see yourself differently.
Next: "STIMMING COLDPLAY WHILE WATCHING PARENTHOOD" (2024) A brand new long-form comedic essay by Mark Steele. Exclusively written for the Mark Steele Archive.