Interview with Michael Wiese: Michael Wiese Productions

I am very pleased to have the renowned publisher Michael Wiese (Michael Wiese Productions) here to share his views on some of the challenging issues facing writes, publishers and new media developers in today's ever-changing media marketplace.

Michael's publishing company (MWP) began in 1981 and has since become the leading independent publisher of books on screenwriting and filmmaking, with a current line of more than 130 titles. MWP also has a production arm that produces documentaries and independent films (MWP Films).

As a successful independent small press, in an age when small presses are disappearing, MWP has managed to not only hold its brand strong, but to grow and thrive. Anyone working in the publishing world has a lot to learn from a success story like MWP's, and we're lucky enough to get some advice, wisdom and practical know how from one of the masters in the field.

MWP books that cover the whole arc of screenwriting and filmmaking may be found at http://www.mwp.com with a 25% discount.




1. Your publishing company is noted as the leader in the niche entertainment sector. In fact, MWP was recently listed by "MovieMaker Magazine" as one of the top 25 companies that filmmakers need to know. In an age when small presses are dropping like flies, or getting absorbed by larger pubs, how have you managed to maintain your brand and actually grow? And, can you bottle it for the rest of us?

Wish I could bottle it! We are plodders. We take our time. When I first started and learned I could print a book in a few weeks, I failed to understand that that is not "publishing." Publishing is not only printing but preparing the sales and marketing tracks well in advance of having hard copies available. So the ramp up is very important and towards that end we’ve spent years developing contacts and channels of communication so that when a new book comes out, our audience knows about it.

Quality is another thing we pride ourselves on. We find the best people to write what we hope are going to be the definitive books on the subject. That’s why Chris Vogler’s “The Writer’s Journey”, Steve Katz’ “Shot by Shot,” Judith Weston’s “Directing Actors” and dozens of our other books are classics and sell well year in and year out.

Our other ace is that we are filmmakers who essentially publish for ourselves. We ask, "what is it I don’t know that is essential to my skill set as a filmmaker"? When we get the answer we go out and create a book to answer that question. Our competitors are unable to do that. What we do for our readers is turn outsiders into insiders. It’s our goal to make our readers better writers, better filmmakers, better craftsmen so that their work will endure and the careers will grow. Our books are not about our authors but they are about our readers. We get book proposals from big name Hollywood producers and actors but we don’t publish their name-dropping war stories because this information does not empower our readers’ careers. We’ve been successful because we make our readers successful. Those who have read our books appreciate that. So what goes around, comes around.

2. On your website you mention something called “conscious media,” in relation to the new paradigm shifts taking place in publishing. What do you mean by this and how can writers participate in helping formulate this concept?

For years we’ve been publishing "how to" books. We’ve given screenwriters and filmmakers the tools to get it done. But now that you know how to make something, what are you going to make? The big question is “what are you doing and why? Who does it serve? How are you going to use these incredible powers"?

So "conscious media" refers not only to creating works that contribute meaningful to humanity but it also refers to the process of ‘awakening’ the consciousness of the media-maker. After all, writing and filmmaking bring others into a certain state of consciousness. To lead a reader or viewer to new insights and dimensions, the filmmaker has to be conscious, awake and able to access these spaces as well.

We’ve already published books that dip into this area such as “The Writer’s Journey," “Stealing Fire from the Gods," “Deep Cinema: Film as Initiation” and others. My recent film, “The Sacred Sites of the Dalai Lamas,” and my new film (currently in post), “The Shaman & Ayahuasca: Journeys into Sacred Realms,” explore these dimensions of consciousness. My not so secret agenda is to empower a generation of filmmakers who will in turn inspire, engage and create works that will contribute to humanity for years to come. It’s 5 minutes to midnight. The days of creating mindless drivel and eye-candy are over. It’s time to wake up.

3. Your company has developed an impressive list of titles for filmmakers, screenwriters, and aspiring film/TV artists. With so many books on the nuts and bolts of craft already in your back list, how do you make editorial decisions when a new story structure book crosses your desk, or another book on how to write great characters? This must be getting harder and harder. Who do you pick and to whom do you send that lovely rejection letter? Can you share some of your editorial process?

There are a million facets to the diamond. There is always another way to create meaningful content. Bodies of knowledge can be sliced and diced infinitely. What we are looking for are new ideas for media making books and other communication products. Sometimes we’ll have an idea and take it to an author. Other times our authors or prospective authors will pitch an idea. My job is to twist and turn an idea with the author until we are really clear on what the book is about. Once done, we let the author roll with it. We are not about doing derivative work. We want really fresh ideas that will turn on our audiences and inspire them in some way. I like to look to other disciplines and how those bodies of knowledge influence say screenwriting, storytelling or character development - subjects like psychology, the Enneagram, the chakra system, meditation, architecture, mythic structure and so on. The list is quite long. The possibilities endless.

4. It’s looking like 2010 is going to be the year of the e-book. Two thousand nine was good, but analysts are projecting 2010 to be 30-40% better. What role will e-books play in your company next year (or coming years) and how can authors respond to this new format to jump start writing careers? Also, will you be offering Kindle books in the future?

We expect about 15 of our books to go "live" on the Kindle and other platforms any moment now. It’s taken a long time to sort this out. We have another 50 titles that are being prepared for release right now. Amazon expects a 10% uptick in our revenues from e-books (and they usually under-estimate our growth). But we really don’t know what this move means. Amazon tells us that people like to have the hard copy in their library and an e-book copy on their portable devices so that e-book growth isn’t expected anymore to wipe out the traditional book. Did television wipe out the movies? Different platforms, different purposes and experiences.

5. Author platforms are all the rage. The days when publishers promote their new writers with marketing campaigns, signing tours, etc. are long gone (unless you’re Dan Brown or J.K. Rowling). Now we writers have to “do it ourselves” and the new media platform has become essential just to get a first-time deal with many agents or pubs. What does MWP require in the way of an author having his/her platform in place, prior to submitting proposals? Do you care? What platform components would you recommend as essential for any first time writer trying to get a presence on the web?

Success in publishing comes with a collaboration between authors and publishers. The more active and visible an author is – on any platform, the more noticeable his or her book will be. The late, great Blake Snyder was a master of promotion. He told people about his book anywhere, 24-7. I saw him not just work a room but work Chicago’s Ohare airport when we walked through there together to catch a plane. He had a 5-foot-high poster for “Save the Cat" and talked to everyone about his book! When he was frisked by security he was pitching! He formed screenwriting forums both online and in dozens of cities. He held seminars, gave lectures, interviews, had an inactive and daily updated website, a Facebook fan site, etc. He did it all. Of course publishers like authors who are very proactive. If you just sit around waiting to be discovered – you won’t be. 


6. Simon & Shuster recently introduced their new concept for hybrid media: the vook (part book, part interactive video). How do you think vooks and other hybrid formats are going to impact your business? These could have a major impact in the nonfiction and how-to markets (cookbooks, instructional, etc.). Since so many of your publications are instructional and/or how-to, will you be expanding into this area? And should writers who want to submit vookish proposals be comfortable doing so?

I think this is a very cool and appropriate concept – hybrid books. But until they are more established we’ll probably only dabble in it for the moment. (We’ve got a few of these in the works.) Sometimes its better to be second rather than first. Film books that teach filmmaking should be a no-brainer for this format but you still have to clear studio movies that you would use as examples and there’s the rub. They simply won’t play unless you are willing to spend tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars on clearances. So to license that kind of video material the math will never work. Still it’s a very exciting area that we are watching closely.


7. One last question on the sea change taking place in publishing; not that anyone knows where things will land. But, with books, nooks, Kindles, etc. the format zoo for new media is getting as bewildering as particle physics. At the end of the day its about the written word — or is it? Do you think the web’s influence here is just “flavor of the month” or is there no going back? Are books going the way of newspapers? What does it all mean? I hope you know!

Books are artifacts. They say something about their owners. They are part of our identity. When you sit down in Starbucks and read a book it identifies you. If you read from a Kindle it doesn’t or at least not in the same specific way. However, portable devices offer other advantages. If you are a doctor going to Africa to run a clinic you’ll take a Kindle loaded with your medical reference books rather than 500 lbs of books.

But I think you answered your own question – Kindle or hard copy – the reading experience has to deliver.

8. What new projects, initiatives, or hot, new writers are you developing for 2010?

We’ve got about 30 titles in the development and writing stages. We are contemplating a whole new line of books but its far too early to announce that. I’ll be finishing and releasing “The Shaman & Ayahuasca," which I shot in Peru, and next month am shooting a doc in Bali about the “unseen worlds." We’ve got some new things we’ll be doing with our website. But all this aside, we are plodders and will continue to carefully develop and nurture the best books we can.


9. What question should I have asked that I didn’t?

If you are traveling in space at the speed of light and you turn on your headlights, will anything happen? Thank you for your intelligent questions.

Kirkus Reviews Closes Doors

After 76 years in the book review business, "Kirkus Reviews" has been closed by its parent company, The Nielsen Company. Nielsen also shuttered "Publishers & Editors," another independent voice in the publishing world, started in 1901!

Kirkus, for those of you who may not know, was a leading provider of book reviews for the book trade, entertainment industry, schools and universities, and libraries throughout the country. They reviewed about 5,000 books per year, and while vilified by some for being hackneyed and superficial, more than not Kirkus has been honored for providing a truly independent voice in book reviews. Many authors have valued being covered by Kirkus, prior to publication, and their pre-pub reviews often made a significant difference to authors hoping to get a shot in the arm prior to official publication.

But now, one more voice has been silenced. Why? The same reason newspapers have died (yes, they are dead—the print form anyway) and the same reason venerable magazines are dropping like flies: vertically integrated companies like Nielsen can not financially justify keeping these acquisitions alive in the face of the new media juggernaut.

Nielsen Business Media President Greg Farrar's memo about the magazine shutdowns follows:

Dear Colleagues,

Today, we announced that Nielsen Business Media has reached an agreement with e5 Global Media Holdings, LLC, a new company formed jointly by Pluribus Capital Management and Guggenheim Partners, for the sale of eight brands in the Media and Entertainment Group, including Adweek, Brandweek, Mediaweek, The Clio Awards, Backstage, Billboard, Film Journal International and The Hollywood Reporter. e5 Global Media Holdings has also agreed to acquire our Film Expo business, which includes the ShoWest, ShowEast, Cinema Expo International and CineAsia trade shows.

In addition, we've made the decision to cease operations for Editor & Publisher and Kirkus Reviews.

This move will allow us to strengthen investment in our core businesses - those parts of our portfolio that have the greatest potential for growth - and ensure our long-term success. We remain committed to building our trade show group and affiliated brands. These assets continue to be a key part of The Nielsen Company's overall portfolio and we strongly believe they are positioned to grow as the economy recovers. In addition, we'll continue to assess the strategic fit of our remaining portfolio of publications.

As a result of these decisions, many of our friends and colleagues within these businesses will be leaving the company or will begin to transition to the new ownership immediately. These venerable brands have long been an important part of our Business Media family, and we are pleased that e5 will continue to capitalize on the brands' potential. The transition is expected to be complete by the end of the year.

Pluribus Capital was founded in 2009 by James Finkelstein, George Green and Matthew Doull to focus on acquiring and managing industry leading media properties with high growth potential, particularly those with strong brand recognition across multiple platforms including digital, print and events. Guggenheim Partners is a privately held, diversified financial services firm. Both Pluribus and Guggenheim have strong track records of successfully managing investments in a variety of companies.

I want to take this opportunity to offer heartfelt thanks to our colleagues who will be leaving the company for their dedication and commitment to Nielsen over the years. Please join me in wishing them well in their future endeavors.

Regards,

Greg Farrar
President
Nielsen Business Media

In the case of Kirkus, who will take up this slack? Who will review the books? Supposedly, sites like GoodReads will start expanding its offerings to fill in the void. GoodReads is a social networking community of 2,600,000 readers, who have panned and celebrated 64,000,000 books, since its inception. But, can blogging sites really do the job? I doubt it. Just as blogging sites aren't noted for their journalistic prowess (i.e., citizen journalism), can they likewise be relied on for book review prowess? Or will we have a glut of author publicists, friends and family, and PR hacks clogging the blogosphere with self-serving book reviews that have no authenticity or critical value?

If you are an author who got trashed by Kirkus over the years, then you are probably dancing a jig, or as one author rejoiced, "Die Kirkus, die!" Personally, I find this horrible and sad. Not because I oppose the evolution to new media (quite the contrary), but because independent voices in media are vanishing like endangered species in the Amazonian jungle: quickly, with hardly a blink of the eye. We need to preserve independent, critical voices in media, not vertically integrate them, or worse, hand them over to the blog-mob (of whom I am one!), assuming citizen reviewers, like citizen journalists, will somehow have the chops to deliver critical reviews, objectively and with some panache. What we're likely to see are, "Shit man! That was a kickass book! You should buy it," or "Don't waste your money dude ... wait for the movie ... movies rock!"

Just shoot me now.

Please don't get me wrong; I am not a snob or an elitist. This post isn't about trashing everyone who blogs or who has an opinion about "stuff." I'm all for the grand conversation that is taking place all around us on the Internet. I'm not worried about journalism's future (it will survive and thrive), and I believe all critical forms like reviews of movies or books will also survive. I just can't help mourning when a species is killed off because its too expensive to keep it alive. And even as more windows open to voices everywhere, we need to be sure when others are closed they are not lost forever. Even one less voice in the world means we are all made a little more silent.

(Full Disclosure: I USED TO work for Kirkus as a book reviewer.)

Mid-November, Harlequin announced the launch of Harlequin Horizons, a new division billed as "[an] opportunity for women's fiction writers and romance authors to publish their books and achieve their dreams," provided they've got cashola to subsidize that publication. The partnership with subsidy-publishing juggernaught AuthorSolutions drew instant opposition from several authors guilds, which quickly lambasted Horizons as a vanity press operation. The Romance Writers of America announced Harlequin wouldn't be eligible for favored-publisher privileges at next year's national convention, the Science Fiction Writers of America announced "NO titles from ANY Harlequin imprint will be counted as qualifying for membership in SFWA," and the Mystery Writers of America said it might also take that route.

(Some of the above quoted from Mediabistro's Galleycat, 2009)

Since mid-November, Harlequin tried to sneak under the radar, re-branding Harlequin Horizons as DellArte Press, and the Mystery Writers of America jumped off the fence to the “personae non grate” side, declaring Harlequin as no longer a member of its prized “approved publishers” list. According to its rules, a "publishing entity" must "be wholly separate and isolated" from "an entity that provides self-publishing, for-pay editorial services, or for-pay promotional services." Harlequin’s alliance with AuthorSolutions violates these conditions, ergo the personae-non-grate status.

Who cares? Well, Harlequin does, that’s for sure. But, writers should care about this development as well. The various guilds find themselves in murky waters vis-à-vis pubs decisions to leverage the emerging power of Internet self-publishing. At a time when every angle is being explored to expand a publishing company’s bottom line, this once clear line in the sand separating the vanity world of wannabe authors from the proud world of made-it authors (i.e., published versus really published) is vanishing. As businesses, the pubs are scrambling to shore up the leaking business models of yesteryear, hoping against hope a new model that will show them to the golden road of profitability will emerge soon.

In the meantime, a profit center is emerging in the chaos. Subsidy publishing is on the rise and writers, the good, bad, and ugly are flocking to this opportunity. How should the guilds respond? Should they oppose, outright, traditional publishers from venturing into these profitable waters? Are they only trying to protect traditionally published author’s territories and their own member bases? Or are they missing an opportunity to follow the lead of some of these pubs that see the writing on the wall and are trying to adapt and innovate?

Questions, questions, I’m full of them. I don’t have the answer on this one. I’m not condemning either side. I see how each has its own reasons for picking one or the other side of this fence. I just think the guilds should not be so quick to throw down the gauntlet. Things are evolving for everyone in the publishing industry and writers, their organizations, and the publishers and their organizations are all scrambling to make sense of something that is still in flux. I understand it’s hard to not take a position, especially when special interests or feisty memberships demand such, but careful consideration is in order. I’m still looking at all the pros and cons for pubs moving in the subsidy-publishing direction, because I’m not convinced this could not be a win-win for everyone, if communication stays open and cooler heads prevail.

Maybe not, though, maybe this is just one more ploy to screw writers … except for the fact that the emerging group of writers in the subsidy arena kind of consider themselves writers too. Including the half-dozen or so who have made the New York Times bestseller list. Gosh—it’s all getting so bloody complicated. Grand, isn’t it.

[Full Disclosure: I work for AuhorSolutions as an editorial consultant.]

Why Twitter Matters to Writers

I know, I'm writing a lot about Twitter these days. There's a reason. It's getting to be a force in the writing universe. Consider the following:

I've heard it all before--as have you, "Why bother with Face Book, Twitter, My Space (so not cool now), etc.? Just a black hole of my time and keystrokes. Who has time?" I've heard myself say these same things.

Well, 28-year-old Justin Halpern found the time to setup his Twitter account titled "ShitMyDadSays." It has over 700,000 followers. One of those followers is CBS television. And--please sit down for this so you don't fall down--they just signed Justin to a TV deal. In addition, Justin signed a book deal recently based on his Dad who says shit.

Here's a sample:

"You look just like Stephen Hawking...Relax, I meant like a non-paralyzed version of him. Feel better? ... Fine. Forget I said it."

("ShitMyDadSays," Twitter 2009, Justin Halpern)

I can totally see how a creative executive at a network could run with this. Whoever saw the potential in this tweet made their salary for the year. And they made the right call. This is perfect for sitcom development, and this is the kind of stuff that fuels TV development all the time. I completely see how this could spin off into a multi-camera, family sitcom.

So, why Twitter matters, why Face Book matters, etc., beyond the social networking aspects, is that there are companies out there scouring these sites for ideas. We've all known for a dog's age that media companies have their story department interns reading e-books, watching every new web series, and listening to podiocasts galore. Web series like "Quarterlife" are now legendary for jumping species and moving to TV (disastrously in Quarterlife's case). But, now the focus of the Great Eye is now taking in anything where an ounce of creativity might show itself.

The point here is that writers can no longer take social networking for granted. Social applications where you can create a presence for yourself are gold. They are part of doing business for the writer, like writing every day, or calling your agent every week, or drinking gallons of coffee. You have to have a presence in all these venues. It's time consuming and a pain in the ass, but if you want to work, if you want exposure, if you want to be seen by the Great Eye that sees all things remotely creative, then you have to play the game.

If you watch anyone under thirty, you will notice they spend as much time thumbing their mobile device as they do making eye contact. These are the people who are being hired into power positions at networks and studios. I'm an old fart, but I'm tech savvy and I know this stuff, so I'm not behind the curve. But, how about you? Do you have your blog? Do you have a Twitter account? Are you marketing yourself in all the places you can to maximize visibility for your work and your brand? Even if you don't have a brand?

I'm happy for Justin. But, his story is no different than the stories we used to hear about in the indie movie world where the young-up'n-comer from out of nowhere lands the movie deal for the sixteen millimeter short he/she shot while on summer break from school. We just heard a similar story with the phenom "Paranormal Activity," shot for 15,000 by an unknown director two years ago. Recently released by Paramount, "Paranormal" is now pushing 100 million domestic and hasn't even been released globally. There are always the lottery winners out there who fuel the dreams of struggling filmmakers and writers everywhere. "Hey, that might be me next!" I say dream on, and congratulations Justin.

But, in the meantime, while you wait for the lottery to shine on you, take a cold, hard look at what is happening in the marketplace and on the Web. This is where writers have to be in the years to come (screw years-months). It's just starting. We don't even know how all this is going to end up, because it is constantly evolving. All I know is that Justin is a huge shout to us all to rethink our businesses and our writing. I'm not saying you have to abandon traditional values and/or methods, or that you have to start writing 140-character novels. I'm only suggesting its time to open up the repertoire and design a business model for your career that leverages the world as it is, not as it was.

Publishing, movies, television, it's all changing--and fast. Justin is our canary in the coal mine, only instead of dying form poisonous gases he is flying high for being in the right place at the right time. You can too. It just takes work and attention to your writing life--screw the lottery. You have to be your own lottery.

Twitter-lit Redux

A few days ago I wrote a post on something called Twitter-lit. Twitter has always been about real-time reality, being in the moment, life in the raw in 140 characters (or less) at a time. Then, one day, someone decided to depart from reality and just make stuff up (like no one ever makes things up on Twitter)—voila, fiction and Twitter meet: Twitter-lit.

Today The Huffington Post (wonderful online newspaper) started a Twitter-lit contest. It invited its readers to submit their version of the great books in literature. In other words, give them a 140-character version of War and Peace. If you know about screenwriting, or have ever worked in the entertainment business in story development, then what you are going to see next will look familiar. Here are some samples of what the Huffpo readers submitted:

Mary Shelley’s Frankinstein by AskMrScreens:
Misunderstood monster only wants a friend in a recycling project run amok, with an ending that goes up in flames! (Huffington Post, 10/06/09)

Bram Stoker’s Dracula by marcywoody:
Creep preys on the veins and sexual desire of eager young women. Despite immortality, his thirst is forever quenched by one heroic doctor. (Huffington Post, 10/06/09)

Jane Austin’s Sense and Sensibility by LolaDanger:
One sister wanting romance, the other craving good chat (both hot for rich brits) outplay a manipulative bitch and an emasculated gigolo. (Huffington Post, 10/06/09)

(Read more at: http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/10/29/huffpost-twitterature-con_n_333974.html?slidenumber=grlh7L0PxJM%3D#slide_image&cp)

Okay screenplay hounds. The Internet culture calls these examples Twitter-lit. But, screenwriters will recognize these as something else, something we use and agonize over for hour, days, sometimes weeks (or more). These little flavor-of-the-month masterpieces above are nothing more than loglines!

A logline is your movie (or book) in a sentence. It is a complicated, complex, and challenging little beastie. The logline has to capture the essence of your story, meaning it has to give a sense of the core relationship driving the story, the high-concept conceit of the story, and a hint of the conclusion without giving too much away. Loglines are essential tools for anyone who works in the movie and/or television business. Anyone who has done script coverage has had to come up with a logline. And any writer pitching a story to an agent has had to get that logline perfect for their elevator pitch. It is also important for novelists, though less so. Loglines get movies made, when they’re good. And when they’re bad—well, you know the rest.

What I find fascinating about this little exercise by Huffpo is that this “new thing” is being touted as a new thing, when it is as old as the hills. This all speaks to an important idea to always keep in mind: nothing about writing on the web or for new media is really “new.” Take away all the SEO (search engine optimization) gibberish, all the IA (interactive architecture) interfaces, and all the Web 2.0 gobbledygook and you are left with words on a page. It’s all “just” writing. You can put all the lipstick you want on that pig; you still have pork. I’m all for repackaging and re-branding ideas, but it is important for writers not to get too caught up in the hype of “the next big thing.”

I’m enjoying all the new formats, platforms and delivery windows that are opening up for writers thanks to the Internet, but I’m taking my own advice. I will just keep my wonder and awe reserved for the simple written word that knows no gimmicks, attention-grabbers, or leaps in the technology zeitgeist. Trust me, I’m no Luddite, I’m a technology champion. I just think it’s important not to lose sight of the fact that so much of what we’re seeing in new media content delivery is really just a variation of the old notion, “What was old is new again.”

Netflix perfected the movie-rental-by-mail model and opened the door for copycat imitators to quickly follow. In this case, however, an innovative company called Bookswim has been trying since 2007 to implement the Netflix model to book rentals.

As Bookswim explains it:

"Bookswim creators George Burke and Shamoon Siddiqui spent their Thursday night as always, freeloading books in the local behemoth bookstore café. When asked to pay for the books along with the coffee, they replied, "No, we're just gonna read them and put them back... but thanks for asking." Now this kind of behavior should never be condoned, but George and Shamoon noticed a pattern: everyone else was doing it, although maybe not so openly. If all of these people were simply reading, why aren't they vagrantly loitering at a library? It's free! Well, there's no double mocha lattes at the library ... but through researching the answer they discovered that the whole literary distribution model needed to be turned upside down." (Bookswim.com 2009)

And so they did … turned things upside down. Through this effort Bookswim hopes to play its part in saving some of the 22-million trees cut down each year to produce books, not to mention the gas that will be saved from driving to the bloody bookstore every week. Okay, the post office uses trucks to ship the books to you, and the local post office drives around town in their little putt-putts, but hey, the point is still valid. So, in short, Bookswim is good for the environment -- and it’s slimming too!

Mediabistro’s Gallycat (the best blog on Earth) has a great interview with Chip O’Brien, Director of Customer service for Bookswim, where he discusses the phenom. Check out the full interview here: GALLYCAT BOOKSWIM INTERVIEW.

It’s a brave new world out there for books, authors, publishers, and readers. I’m fascinated by all these changes and will be commenting more about these new-fangled ideas as I stumble upon them. Who said reading is dead?

Twitter-Lit: The Opportunities for Writers Keep on Coming!

We’re all familiar with adaptation. What novelist doesn’t want his or her book adapted to a movie? Everything is open for the adaptation magnet: poems, books, comics, commercials, everything. This truth is no less true now with so-called new media. As the Internet evolves, so do the windows for creative expression. We now have the first Twitter-lit adaptation to film.

What the hell is Twitter-lit, you ask? Good question. It’s essentially a Twitter haiku. Somebody writes a 140-character fictional message, rather than talking about what he or she had for lunch, or how the job interview was a disaster. As fascinating as your life might be that you have to tell the world what you're doing every 10 minutes, imagine how much fun it might be to just make things up? Because everyone tells EXACTLY what they are doing, and never embellish or make things up on Twitter--right? So, think fiction. Think short. Now think even shorter. Now you're in the ballpark.

This is an exploding phenom, or so Twitter claims. There are more and more people jumping onto this flash-fictionesque platform. Twitter-lit authors submit daily “stories” and are finding a following. This is certainly familiar to fans of flash fiction. This form of fiction (flash) has many devotees, and there is no real agreement on what constitutes flash fiction, but some go as low as 300-word max. Never more than 1000 words.

The most famous form of flash fiction, of course, is the one Hemingway created that was only six-words long: "For sale: baby shoes, never worn." This is, in fact, archetypal Twitter-lit. Twitter imposes a maximum character length for any post of 140 characters. So, not unlike other physical formats (poetry, screenplays, short stories, etc.) technology is placing limits on writers, and we must step up to the challenge to prove creativity has no limits, even when they are artificially imposed by the information superhighway pipeline requirements.

Apparently, Twitter-lit authors are pulling it off, because one of them just got adapted to film. See this post from the Mediabistro Galleycat blog by Jason Boog on Oct 08, 2009:

"The world's first Twitter-lit adaptation has won the People's Choice Award at the International Filminute competition. Twitter author Arjun Basu rallied his army of Twitter readers, a readership gained as Basu publishes bite-sized, fictional tweets like this short-short story every day: "They tolerated the ennui of their jobs, bought off by promises of spectacular riches sometime in the future. At retirement, they bought guns." Now Canadian director James Cooper adapted one of Basu's stories into a minute-long film called "Life." As the press release about the winning films shows, the short film genre is booming--start writing your Twitter scripts today... "

So, get out your stubbiest pencil and start writing your pithy, action-packed, visually-stunning Twitter-lit so that all those production companies and studios who regularly farm through these sorts of things looking for the "next big thing" can find you and sign you to a seven-figure deal. Or if that has little or no attraction to you (God, I hope so for your sake), then just do it 'cause it's bloody fun. I just might myself.

Let Us Now Praise Stephanie Harrison: Again!

On September 26th I posted an entry on Stephanie Harrison’s book Adaptations: From Short Story to Big Screen and promised to try to track her down to do an interview about her book and her writing experience. Well, the writing gods have smiled and she found me. Below is my interview with her and it’s wonderful and insightful and too short. If you haven’t read the earlier post please do, and then come back to read this. BUY THIS BOOK! You won’t be sorry. Thanx again Stephanie! J.

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1. Can you talk a bit about why your compiled this anthology?

I was trying to find an anthology like this to use in a fiction writing class—I was sure there would be one out there somewhere. But I discovered there wasn’t and thought I’d just compile one myself. (Now, having done it, I understand why it hadn’t been done. Anthologies are a lot of work, and this one in particular took a lot of tedious research.)

Anyway, I wanted an anthology like this because I was teaching creative writing and my students were turning in short stories that looked (to me) a lot like movie treatments. Understandable. We’ve all seen more movies than we’ve read short stories. So I thought it might be instructive to look at a few short stories alongside their movie adaptations and talk about the differences.

For example, it’s worth noting that content of the story “The Killers” is the first ten minutes or so of the feature-length film. There are exceptions, but the scope of a short story is generally much smaller than a film and certainly smaller than a novel. So in addition to all the obvious things you need to learn when you’re learning to write, you also need to figure out what the form you’re using can reasonably contain.

I’ve discovered that it’s useful to use movies in the undergraduate creative writing classroom, although it’s highly irregular. The fact is, our students are very savvy about almost every other media form except literature. As I point out to them, gently of course, their literary taste is equivalent to elevator music. They would be embarrassed to claim an orchestral version of “The Girl from Ipanima” as their music of choice, but they want that kind of smooth accessibility from literature. Or, put another way, they can handle a fractured narrative in films like Memento or Pulp Fiction, but in a story it’s too difficult. Why is that?

2. Do you think the trend to adapt comic books and graphic novels vs. prose fiction, as source adaptation material, is a bad thing?

I’ve liked, even loved, a lot of films made from graphic material. I think what you’re trying to get at here, though, is the fact that a graphic story might be easier to sell than prose fiction because people in film tend to be visually oriented.

I don’t think that means that adapting graphic material is easier. Once again, when you move from one form to another there are gains and losses. One of the strengths of prose fiction is the opportunity for the reader to experience a character’s thoughts. The rough equivalent in film is the voiceover, which can be annoying, self-conscious or pretentiously “meta” depending on how much or how well it’s used. So a book that’s heavy on interior monologue can be a real challenge to adapt.

Similarly, one of the strengths of graphic fiction is the symbolic/intuitive/shorthand level on which it works. Think, for example, of Charlie Brown and the simplicity of his face and expressions. To replace Charlie Brown with an actor—any actor—would make him too particular—too, well, real. Or think of Art Spiegelman’s Maus, which works so brilliantly, and in a way that novels or stories about the holocaust can’t. The graphics allow the reader to experience the material at a remove, or at least on a different level. So I guess I’m arguing that there are inherent challenges in adapting graphic material that people may ignore because it seems easier.

3. What was your greatest challenge writing this book?

Compiling an anthology is a lot harder than you might think, particularly if you refuse to settle on an audience. From the very beginning we (my agent, editor and I) pondered whether this would appeal more to readers or movie buffs and we couldn’t figure it out. So in the end, they sent me off to write the book I’d like to read. And since I enjoy both I tried to balance the two. It would certainly have been a different and easier-to-compile anthology if I’d come at it from one side or the other.

4. How did you settle on the thirty-five stories that comprise the collection?

The nuts and bolts of it went something like this: I worked a long list of what I considered worthwhile movies, checking off one by one whether or not they had been adapted from a short story. (Not that easy, because, as you probably know “adapted from a story by” is not the same as “adapted from a short story by” but it can be. I chased down a lot of red herrings.) Then I worked the list of authors, looking for adaptations of work from writers I admired. It was all extremely tedious and locating some of the older stories was sometimes very difficult. I ended up with about 200 possibles. Then I read and read and read and watched and watched and watched.

I whittled 200 down to about 75 for the proposal -- and my editor decided that 35 was a good number to shoot for. Picking the final stories was like putting a puzzle together. The thing is, you don’t always get permission to reprint what you want. Or a story turns out to be too expensive to justify. And you can’t have too many long stories because you have to watch the page count. And all the time you have your eye on the quality of the story v. the quality of the movie and then that added serendipity, the backstory behind the adaptation. So you move things around. You look for patterns and examples and what has and has not been anthologized a lot. If it’s an easily found story is there justification for reprinting it yet again? And so forth.

5. What did you leave out that you’re sorry you couldn’t include?

I wanted James Thurber’s “The Secret Life of Walter Mitty” but it was too expensive. And “Sally Bowles” by Christopher Isherwood was too long. And Salinger doesn’t ever give reprint permission, but his story “Uncle Wriggely in Connecticut” was adapted into a sweet, little-known film called My Foolish Heart.

6. Do you have a favorite story that adapted well to the screen? A worst?

I have a lot of favorites, but one story I worked particularly hard to get was Budd Schulberg’s “Your Arkansas Traveler” which was adapted as A Face in the Crowd. It’s about a guy named Lonesome Rhodes who, through sheer folksiness, rockets out of nowhere to become a political/cultural phenom. A quote from the story:

… it takes a free (and free-wheeling) society for a success like his [Lonesome Rhode’s], and for another it takes a particular hopped-up kind of free society. Our kind, God bless it. This is a real screwball country, if you stop to think about it. Where else would the girls be tearing the clothes off skinny, pasty-faced boys with neurotic voices like Frank Sinatra … Or making Lonesome Rhodes, an obvious concoction if ever there was one, their favorite lover-boy and social philosopher? …

This country has a terrible hankering for its lost frontier, the way a mother forever mourns for a son run down by a truck when he was seven years old. The frontier song has ended, but oh how the melody lingers on. That’s why we don’t trust brain-trusters and professors. Lonesome said it perfectly on the air one day. “My Grandpaw Bascom never went to no school an’ he was the smartest fella in the county. Everything I know I owe t’ my Granddaddy Bascom who didn’ know nuthin’ either …

The story, written in the fifties, had been long out of print and I thought it and the film deserved some attention. The film wasn’t an overwhelming success when it came out, but it’s aged extremely well—and is, I think, more relevant than ever. I’d even go so far as to say that if the character of Lonesome Rhodes had been a woman, she would have been winkin’, doggoneit.

7. Do you think it is important that a director be a reader of fiction (like Hitchcock, Hawks, etc.). Many young directors aren’t passionate readers, these days.

That was one of the surprising things I learned while compiling this anthology. Being a reader really is an advantage for filmmakers. After all, the material has to come from somewhere. The cautionary tale is Carol Reed, who didn’t like to read and relied on his wife to do it for him. Once Reed’s successful, productive and profitable relationship with Graham Greene—a partnership responsible for The Third Man and The Fallen Idol among other fine films—had run its course, Reed’s career pretty much tanked. He was never again able to find material that suited his point of view.

8. You have a Hitchcock quote, “I do not let the writer go off on his own and just write a script that I will interpret. I stay involved with him and get him involved in the direction of the picture. So, he becomes more than a writer; he becomes part maker of the picture.” This is a notion that would give most movie studio creative executives a stroke. Do you think Hitch’s idea is relevant today, or at all to a good adaptation?

Well, I think Hitchcock was a bit disingenuous when he said this. The writers who worked with him would probably disagree. But I do think it’s a shame that writers aren’t given more respect, because when a writer/director relationship works and continues over several films, it’s a thing of beauty.

9. What are you working on now and when can we buy it?

In the summer of 2004 I read in the newspaper that the wife of Somalia’s former dictator had died in Columbus, Ohio at the age of 72. I had just returned to Columbus from Florida, where I had spent three years, and this news came as a bit of a surprise. I hadn’t been aware of the Somali community when I left, but when I returned it was becoming too large to miss. Today there are upwards of 50,000 Somalis in our heartland city, and I’m told that three Somali families move to Columbus every day. It’s the second largest Somali community in the country, behind Minneapolis.

Huh, I thought to myself, that’s interesting. Since I was looking for work, I talked my way into a job teaching English to adult Somali refugees. And somewhere along the line I decided theirs was a story that needed to be told.

So I’m writing about the strangers that came to my town. Poor. Black. Muslim. From the most failed of failed states—there hasn’t been a functioning government in Somalia since 1991, when the dictator fled. In fact, the U.N. has recently declared Somalia the worst humanitarian crisis in Africa, surpassing even Darfur. But unlike Darfur, Somalia is a no-go zone, too dangerous and intractable to help.

The working title is Sweet and Bitter Run and it’s a story about unlikely friendships and a mutual love of words. About grammar and poetry and politics. I don’t know when you’ll be able to buy it, but thanks for asking. I’ve been working like crazy and I should be able to pursue a book contract in the very near future. I’ll let you know. You and my mother. She keeps asking the same question.

10. Will you put out any new editions of Adaptations, with additional stories?

Maybe not additional stories, but I would love to do an update at some point and swap a few out to keep the collection up to date. I’m not sure if that will happen or not.

11. What question did I not ask that I should have?

I think I’ve rambled enough …

A Proposal To Save Scripted TV! (Warning: Rant Alert)

Forgive me for letting off steam, but I’m pissed. I’m working on developing a TV series with a company, and it is a grand, fun, fulfilling, and educational experience. I’m really having a great time. Yes, you hear the “but” coming a mile away, don’t you?

But--the mindset that rules how TV series operate is crazy making. First, let me make clear, my middle name is not Pollyanna. I have been trying to produce film and TV content for a long time and have been around the block, swum with the sharks, danced with the devil, and shoveled my own share of s@#it to get projects down the road to development. TV exists to sell soap; it is not an instrument of entertainment, it is a sales tool. TV shows are aired by networks to create a reason for people to watch commercials, not because they are pursuing high-art. This is not true for the Internet (yet), but it is the nature of TV. In short, I have no illusions. I really do get it.

But--with that said, why can’t we just let a TV show have it’s natural life span? Why do we have to drag out a series for nine seasons because economically it makes “sense”? My beef with this comes up now because I’m currently beating my head against this wall with my colleagues. I’m telling them that the show we're trying to put up is a one season killer-diller, any more than that and it will be diluted. They insist it has to “have legs” past one season, otherwise there will be no incentive for the suits and executives to do the show. They simply won’t spend the money if they can’t get it back eight billion fold; meaning the show has to have a multi-season potential.

But--what if it doesn’t? What if it’s just a perfect one-season show? Why can’t it just live its lifespan naturally and die with dignity? Why does it have to go on life support with cranked up subplots, dumb-ass new characters, and forced plot lines? Whatever happened to a dignified death? Well, the answer, of course, is what I’ve just been describing. The damn show is making money! And, actors, directors, writers, etc., are making residuals! The gripe here isn't about making money, residuals, or sheckles. We all want to make more money. The problem is not in what is being made, the problem is in what is not being made! The present industry mindset to "push" a show into extinction vs. limiting a show's life, consciously, to allow room for putting up new and even better shows is the problem. I may be a bonehead for suggesting this, but aren’t we all just drinking the network/advertiser Kool Aid? Isn’t there an alternative? Like a good lawyer, I never ask a question for which I don't know the answer--YES, there is!

But--It will take guts, courage (the two aren’t the same), business savvy, and creative moxie. The solution is to let a show end naturally. Don’t push it, don’t extend it, and don’t put it on life support. If you limit shows to 13 or 26 weeks max, then two things can occur: first, viewers have a truly satisfying experience with the show, because it doesn’t fizzle out and “die” from being forced past it’s natural lifespan. Rather, the show follows its natural course and, like a good book, ends right on time. Viewer is happy, happy, happy. But, advertiser is pissed, pissed, pissed. They’ve just lost a cash cow. Right? Not necessarily.

With shorter series, networks have more space for more shows. With shorter series, more producers get their shows up, more writers are working, more revenue flows, more dollars are out there to buy more soap, and there are more and varied shows on the air to show advertising. Shorter shows don’t have to mean lost revenue. More shows means more creative work is available to be shown. How many great shows never see the light of day simply because networks won’t pull their cash cows from the airwaves to make room for new blood, simply because they are afraid of losing ad dollars? If they are smart (and they are) new product can be put up each season, with more in the pipeline. It can be win-win! If, if, if the creative will is there and the business savvy is in place to make it work. And I believe both those things are out there … somewhere.

But--I hear the wail of despair, “How can we pull performing shows from the air, when they are performing! Are you nuts?” Yes, I am. But that’s beside the point. What I’m suggesting is that even though these shows are performing economically, they probably stopped performing creatively a long time ago. I think that artificially sustaining shows that have died creatively by grasping for new story lines to keep viewer interest only shows that a show has stopped being its intended form and is not being “forced” to keep going despite the fact that it has really ended. Viewers watch anyway, because they’re hooked. That’s a good thing, but why not just hook them on something new, maybe something even better? And in the hooking, more work is generated, more revenue spent, etc., etc., and the great wheel of life in Hollywood continues profitably.

But--I’m not totally pig-headed about this. Seinfeld was the kind of show that could have gone on forever. It’s just the nature of the beast. It wasn’t about anything anyway, so there was not storyline to blow up or mutilate. But, how about Lost, which has been lost for seasons. It was done after its first season. What a perfect example of a show that had nowhere to go after thirteen shows. And then there is Battlestar Galactica, one of the best reborn series in TV history. Three seasons and the producers had the sense to end it. BRAVO! But, it’s spinoff , Caprica, is in the works, so we’ll see. We’ll see.

Be clear that I am not lumping all shows together here. Some shows naturally extend, most don't. What I'm railing against is something like the following:

Cheers, popular 1980s sitcom. Great show, great audience, but as with all great things it started to come to its natural end. But, not wanting to lose the demographic and the time-slot that was generating lots of cash, the producers and network decided to "give the show legs." The decision was made to make a change so they could come up with new story lines to keep their audience. So--what did they do? They had Sam, the womanizing bar-keep fall in love with Diane, the snobbish intellectual waitress. That their mutual antagonism and oil-water banter was the heart of the show, and its success, was of no consequence. Some brilliant exec probably thought, "Hey, if they get on each other's nerves as co-workers, how much more fun will it be if they're boyfriend and girlfriend?" Nice idea, lousy reality. The change altered the show's dynamic and it died faster than the first round Bush bailout bill in Congress today. They killed the show to save it, rather than letting it go out with dignity. This is what I'm talking about ... stupid changes in a show to try to keep it alive. This is the norm, not the exception. This is the problem.

So--To summarize: Shows are like life forms. Some are meant to be Galapagos tortoises (daytime soaps) and live forever, while others are more like a Gastrotrich (multi-cellular bug that lives 3 days). Most shows are more like the Gastrotrich. We can still have profitable shows if we are smart enough to know when a show REALLY needs to die. Viewers can have a better experience, more work will be generated with more slots to fill, more work means more advertising and soap selling, and residuals continue to flow. And creatively things can grow exponentially. It’s a Win Win Win.

But--all the pragmatists and my grounded-in-the-real-world contemporaries out there will, without doubt, come back on all this with, “You’re dreaming! Good luck selling that argument. If they buy this, I’ve got a bridge in Alaska!”

A boy can only dream.

Let Us Now Praise Stephanie Harrison: Adaptionatrix Extraordinaire

As you may, or may not know, adaptation of fiction to film is one of my dark loves; hell, I’m researching a book about it! How to adapt, whether to adapt, is it possible to adapt: all these, and other questions related to the topic of adaptation keep me up a night (literally!), along with my cat, Petie, who randomly bites me when I’m not looking and then scuttles under something low to the ground so I can't throw his hairy ass out the window. But, I digress.

In my nocturnal stumblings, I fell upon Adaptations: From Short Story to Big Screen, by Stephanie Harrison. This is a gem of a book. Okay, it came out three years ago, but it’s still a must read book for anyone who writes short stories interested in adaptation, and certainly for screenwriters interested in honing their skills. The only “bad” part of the book is that Stephanie doesn’t include a long enough introduction, but The Directors chapter kind of makes up for it. I just wanted to hear more about what she had to say about the stories, their authors, the process of moving great fiction from page to screen, etc. Her writing is unpretentious and enlivening. The stories are the most wonderful and eclectic mix of prose imaginable, and thoroughly delightful:

• Blow-Up by Julio Cotazar, directed by Michelangelo Antonioni in 1966.
• It Had to Be Murder by Cornell Woolrich, Rear Window directed by Alfred Hitchcock in 1954.
• The Sentinel by Arthur C. Clarke, 2001: A Space Odyssey, directed by Stanley Kubrick in 1968.
• Stage to Lordsburg by Ernest Haycox, Stagecoach, directed by John Ford in 1939.
• A Reputation by Richard Edward Connell, Meet John Doe, directed by Frank Capra in 1949.
• In the Grove by Ryunosuke Akutagawa, Roshomon, directed by Akira Kurosawa in 1951.
• Shoeless Joe Jackson Comes to Iowa by W.P. Kinsella, Field of Dreams, directed by Phil Robinson in 1989.

Just to name a few!

In just one of many wonderful examples, Harrison describes the amazing collaboration between Arthur C. Clark and Stanley Kubrick over the adaptation of Clark’s The Sentinel into 2001: A Space Odyssey. Rather than immediately writing a screenplay from the short story, they both decided to write a novel of it first. Kubrick felt a screenplay was, “ … about the least ideal way of communicating information, especially if it’s visual or emotional … ” They ended up with what Kubrick later called a “fifty-thousand word prose ‘thing.’” They ended up writing the novel and screenplay in tandem, in a kind of race.

What a treat to read the original sources of some of our favorite movies. And, as Stephanie points out in her introduction, “Reading the story that inspired a beloved movie is a little like meeting your mother-in-law for the first time: It’s never less than a revelation.” And how, sister.

I’m trying to track Stephanie down to do an interview with her about this book. I’ll keep you posted. In the meantime, buy this book and have fun. I sure did/am.

I’m Talented—Dammit! Why Can’t I Sell Anything?

I recently worked with a writer who was beside himself with despair. He has been writing for years. He has been writing in every genre. He has been writing in every form: poetry, novels, short stories, narrative nonfiction, screenplay, play, automatic writing, everything. He has tried writing partners, writing alone, following a schedule, writing at random, dictating, stream of consciousness, writing software, you name it. With back against wall and painted into his own little corner of literary Hell, he decides he needs consulting help and that this will, at long last, reveal to him the secrets of why his writing is going nowhere fast.

He knows he’s talented (and he is). He knows he’s a storyteller (and he is). And he knows this is the work he must do (and it is). So—why can’t he sell anything? And then the plaintive cry, “Isn’t it enough to be talented? What the hell to they want from me?” “They,” of course, meaning agents, studios, producers, etc.

And so, here lies the problem. And herein lies the lesson. In all his fussing, ruckus, commotion, and tumult no one ever told him the greatest truth every writer (or artist) needs to hear on day one of their writing career: No! The beaches of Malibu are littered with the bodies of talented writers. Talent isn’t enough. “WHAT?!” Comes the shocked reply, “Then what the #@!% is?”

The response to this greatest truth is a single word: craft. Craft is what makes talent enough. Here was a guy who had a magical way with phrases, wording, subtext, and verbal imagery. But he didn’t know a semi-colon from a steak sandwich and was clueless about the basics of English usage. Beyond the idea of using three acts and having a main character, he had as much use for story structure principles as a concussion.

This poor soul was never told that craft informs talent; not the other way around. There are lots of talented people out there. In fact, everyone has a talent of some kind. Talent is given (by God, Goddess, The Great Pumpkin, whoever). Craft is learned taught by a master, teacher, mentor, or drill sergeant. Talent is part of who you are. Craft is part of what you do. Without craft, talent will always remain in potential; it will never be more than a pale reflection of what it could become.

Craft takes discipline, confidence, perseverance, and practice. Talent takes passion, intuition, trust, and spontaneity. Marry all these together and you find the artist. Lose or deny any one of them and you have the artisan. This is not to say that an artisan is less than an artist! No, no, no. In fact, artisans who master whatever craft ALWAYS find their talent and cannot help but become artists of that craft. But, there is a relationship that exists between craft and talent that must be understood. Even if you come at it through your talent first, you must always come back through craft to truly find the full expression of talent.

To be the artist, as writer, you must learn your craft. This means: grammar, spelling, punctuation, story structure principles, formats and styles, vocabulary, and the tools of the trade. Then with discipline, confidence, perseverance, and practice, practice, practice master the trade; become a master artisan. This takes time. This takes effort. This takes work. This takes patience.

Then something magical happens. Craft skills lift. Talent, always present, begins to stir. Craft gets honed. Talent finds its avenue and begins to flow. Craft becomes second nature, elegant, graceful. Talent finds its voice and soars. Okay, kind of corny and romance novelish, but this is what happens. It's a beautiful thing. Craft is the door and talent is what passes through it from potential to actuality. In time, the two are indistinguishable. You are the craftsperson and the artist and there is no telling them apart. This is the master of their craft and the self-realized creator. This is what we all strive for and what takes a lifetime to achieve—AND WE NEVER GET THERE. As good as we get, there is always more. As frustrating as this may sound, that we never get there, the good news is we become more for the striving.

Craft and talent; learn one to release the other. Learn your craft. And practice, practice, practice.

The Afghan Women's Writing Project

It is my honor to be involved with this mighty effort! These are courageous, inspiring, and talented women whose voices need to be heard, and with help from Afghan Women’s Writing Project they will be! SUPPORT AFGHAN WOMEN WRITERS!

Below is some basic info from the project's blog site:

The Women
The Afghan Women’s Writing Project began as an idea during novelist Masha Hamilton’s last trip to Afghanistan in November 2008. Her interest in Afghanistan was sparked in the late 1990s during the Taliban period, when she understood it was one of the worst places in the world to be a woman. Masha first visited the country in 2004, and was awed and inspired by the resolute courage of the women she met. When she returned, she saw doors were closing and life was again becoming more difficult, especially for women. She began to fear we could lose access to the voices of Afghan women if we didn’t act soon. The Afghan Women’s Writing Project is aimed at allowing Afghan women to have a direct voice in the world, not filtered through male relatives or members of the media. Many of these Afghan women have to make extreme efforts to gain computer access in order to submit their writings, in English, to the project.

The Teachers
The project reaches out to talented and generous women author/teachers here in the United States and engages them, on a volunteer, rotating basis, to teach Afghan women online from Afghanistan. (We are using women teachers solely due to cultural sensitivities in Afghanistan.) Through this ongoing interaction, we hope to encourage the women to develop their voices and share their stories. Portions of the work will be put on a blog on a regular basis. Due to security concerns, we will use the Afghan women writers’ first names only, editing out all names of family and friends and removing locators. Nevertheless, the existence of the blog in the world is a key part of the project for several reasons. First, it is intended to instill a sense of pride for these women. Secondly, it is also intended to educate us, the teachers and readers of the blog, about what the Afghan women’s childhoods and young adulthoods were like under the Taliban, and what they feel about current conditions in their country. The blog is also meant to be a record of the project itself. Finally, it is intended to provide a positive link between Afghans and Americans at a time when those relationships have to some degree soured.

The Project

Everyone involved in the project has donated their time and energy, from Jeff Lyons, the California-based blog master, to Rose Daniels in Brooklyn, NY, who contributed blog design, to Terry Dougherty, the Indiana-based technical specialist who worked tirelessly to set up the online classrooms. The author/teachers themselves are teaching pro bono, making time in already very busy schedules. In finding the writers in Afghanistan, Masha sought the guidance and advice primarily of American Ted Achilles, founder of SOLA (School of Leadership, Afghanistan), who has been living for more than five years in Kabul and Kandahar. She also sought advice from other American friends living there who have connections with young writers at Kabul University. Sally Goodrich, of the Peter M. Goodrich Memorial Foundation, provided the link to Ted Achilles and others. Mrs. Goodrich, along with her husband Don, supports Afghan students here in the U.S., and has spearheaded the building of a girls’ school in Afghanistan.

When Words Fail—Try One of These!

Every year the Washington Post publishes its Mensa Invitational Winners. They ask readers to take any word from the dictionary, alter it by adding, subtracting, or changing one letter, and supply a new definition. Here are this years winners:



1. Cashtration (n.): The act of buying a house, which renders the subject financially impotent for an indefinite period of time.

2. Ignoranus: A person who is both stupid and an asshole.

3. Intaxication: Euphoria at getting a tax refund, which lasts until you realize it was your money to start with.

4. Reintarnation: Coming back to life as a hillbilly.

5. Bozone (n.): The substance surrounding stupid people that stops bright ideas from penetrating. The bozone layer unfortunately, shows little sign of breaking down in the near future.

6. Foreploy: Any misrepresentation about yourself for the purpose of getting laid.

7. Giraffiti: Vandalism spray-painted very, very high

8. Sarchasm: The gulf between the author of sarcastic wit and the person who doesn't get it.

9. Inoculatte: To take coffee intravenously when you are running late.

10. Osteopornosis: A degenerate disease. (This one got extra credit.)

11. Karmageddon: It's like, when everybody is sending off all these really bad vibes, right? And then, like, the Earth explodes and it's like, a serious bummer.

12. Decafalon (n.): The grueling event of getting through the day consuming only things that are good for you.

13. Glibido: All talk and no action.

14. Dopeler Effect: The tendency of stupid ideas to seem smarter when they come at you rapidly.

15. Arachnoleptic Fit (n.): The frantic dance performed just after you've accidental ly walked through a spider web.

16. Beelzebug (n.): Satan in the form of a mosquito, that gets in your bedroom at three in the morning and cannot be cast out.

17. Caterpallor (n.): The color you turn after finding half a worm in the fruit you're eating.

The Washington Post has also published the winning submissions to its yearly contest in which readers are asked to supply alternate meanings for common words. And the winners are:

1. Coffee, n. The person upon whom one coughs.

2. Flabbergasted, adj. Appalled by discovering how much weight one has gained.

3. Abdicate, v. To give up all hope of ever having a flat stomach.

4. Esplanade, v. To attempt an explanation while drunk.

5. Willy-nilly, adj. Impotent.

6. Negligent, adj.. Absentmindedly answering the door when wearing only a nightgown.

7. Lymph, v. To walk with a lisp.

8. Gargoyle, n. Olive-flavored mouthwash.

9. Flatulence, n.. Emergency vehicle that picks up someone who has been run over by a steamroller.

10. Balderdash, n. A rapidly receding hairline.

11. Testicle n. A humorous question on an exam.

12. Rectitude, n. The formal, dignified bearing adopted by proctologists.

13. Pokemon, n. A Rastafarian proctologist.

14. Oyster, n. A person who sprinkles his conversation with yiddishisms.

15. Frisbeetarianism, n. The belief that, after death, the soul flies up onto the roof and gets stuck there.

So, when that right word just escapes you... who needs Roget when you have Mesna?