August 2015 – Jack Sanger

The Art of Writing No. 50

I suspect that writing is changing and I don’t mean the usual changes that occur over time such as the treatment of taboo subjects or social observation or Joycean playfulness with words. The coming generations will not be wedded to the printed word or screen-based text in quite the way I was for most of… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 50
The Art of Writing No. 49

Time and continuity are essential ingredients in books and films unless the author or director is setting out deliberately to play with our daily conceptions of the its passage. So the film Memento travels backwards in its plot, and Pincher Martin by William Golding envisages the entire action in the novel being the last few… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 49
The Art of Writing No. 48

The Inspector is a play about the conflict between a dynamic artistic culture and that form of philistinism perpetrated upon the citizens of a country by the social engineering of governmental policies based upon skills, league tables, labour fodder and bottom line accounting. Although it is yet to be performed on stage it has had… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 48
The Art of Writing No. 47

It came straight through my brain without touching the sides my common response to questions about how I wrote Azimuth. Ten years may see forever even for a big novel but then life seems forever until suddenly your candle starts to flicker and then gutter. The psychology of spending a decade on a book, albeit… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 47
The Art of Writing No. 46

I’d like to continue the refrain of Jack Sanger good, Jack Sanger not bad which I began in the last blog. It was in answer to the question I posed myself after my illustrious writer friend opined that I maybe should not deign to build a central character who is a successful writer. My first… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 46
The Art of Writing No. 45

Taking up the theme from blog 44, I’d like to enlarge upon this notion of the ego of the writer – or my own ego in particular! Having been a professor in my last but one incarnation (teacher, social worker, PhD student, researcher, chair in management research and management consultant) I probably have a different… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 45
The Art of Writing No. 44

I spent the weekend with a writer, internationally well known and a long time close friend. We discussed my novella Through a Mirror Clear: a Gothic Love Story, at some length. He had read it twice and made notes on it. It was the kind of experience most writers crave, if they are not too… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 44
The Art of Writing No 43

I have just finished reading a couple of Joseph Conrad novellas; Heart of Darknessand Youth. What strikes me as instructive for the aspiring writer in both of them is how Conrad’s knowledge of the sea and the technology of ships, albeit in the early days of metal hulls and mechanical navigation, becomes a kind of… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No 43
The Art of Writing No. 42

I mentioned plagiarism. There is a form of it which divides writers down the middle. It can be subtle, invasive and even contaminating. It revolves around the issue of whether a novelist should read other writers’ fiction during the process of making a novel. There are many writing manuals which focus on a writer’s need… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 42
The Art of Writing No. 41

In a long series of blogs about one subject, writing, there is bound to be crossover, overlapping and repetition, just the very things the blog warns you against! But, unless it becomes a blog novel, I don’t have to spend time doing excisions and elisions to give it a flow. This, of course, intimates that… Know More
Read more: The Art of Writing No. 41

Jack’s Blog