{"id":752,"date":"2016-03-28T15:14:16","date_gmt":"2016-03-28T20:14:16","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/zachbarnesonwriting.wordpress.com\/?p=752"},"modified":"2016-03-28T15:14:16","modified_gmt":"2016-03-28T20:14:16","slug":"master-insights-haruki-murakami","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/2016\/03\/28\/master-insights-haruki-murakami\/","title":{"rendered":"Master Insights: Haruki Murakami"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every once in a while (or more often than you think), masters of fiction create characters who are themselves writers, following (or birthing) the adage “write what you know.” \u00a0I see this as an opportunity to glean some nuggets of wisdom about the author’s own processes and habits, as evidenced by his main characters themselves. \u00a0So, if you see dialogue about writing written by a writer, it just may be\u00a0a uniquely interesting insight into their own practice. \u00a0Or, they’re trying to mislead the competition, muhahaha!<\/em><\/p>\n

The following\u00a0insight is from Haruki Murakami’s\u00a01Q84<\/em> (a frightfully hard-to-pronounce title, always has me saying IQ…) where one of the protagonists, Tengo, is discussing revisions with his editor:<\/p>\n

“Think of it this way, Tengo. \u00a0Your readers have seen the sky with one moon in it any number of times, right? \u00a0But I doubt they’ve seen a sky with two moons in it side by side. \u00a0When you introduce things that most readers have\u00a0never\u00a0<\/em>seen before into a piece of fiction, you have to describe them with as much precision and in as much detail as possible. \u00a0What you can eliminate from fiction is the description of things that most readers\u00a0have\u00a0<\/em>seen.”<\/p>\n

“I get it,” Tengo said. \u00a0Komatsu’s request made a lot of sense. \u00a0“I’ll fill out the part where the two moons appear” (217).<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

First thing to get out of the way, and I’ll say it as plainly as can be: INFO-DUMPERS, THIS DOES NOT VALIDATE YOUR TECHNIQUE. \u00a0PRECISION AND DETAIL 1) NEED NOT BE OVERLY LONG\/WORDY AND 2) NEED NOT BE\u00a0“DUMPED” ON THE READER ALL AT ONCE.<\/p>\n

whew.<\/p>\n

Now that that’s over with, I’d like to bring your attention to Komatsu’s last\u00a0line, which I believe to be\u00a0the best: “What you can eliminate from fiction is the description of things that most readers\u00a0have\u00a0<\/em>seen.”<\/p>\n

This is a\u00a0suberb\u00a0<\/em>tip for editing a manuscript, especially one set in a\u00a0Secondary World.\u00a0This is a call to flex your imagination-muscles. \u00a0And since humans are experience\/reference-based beings, it a speculative fiction writer’s\u00a0job to draw similarities between our imaginings and things with which people identify. \u00a0More than anything, Komatsu’s\/Haruki’s advice is a call to notice the things that people don’t often notice, and to describe new ideas\u00a0in an extraordinary way.<\/p>\n

So, as a piece of homework-and as homage to Murakami-cut away the ordinary after\u00a0you’ve got all the description that you can muster barfed all over the your first draft. \u00a0“The Ordinary”\u00a0to me includes:<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. formulaic description.<\/li>\n
  2. repetitive\/overly described objects.<\/li>\n
  3. adverbs and adjectives where nouns and verbs suffice.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    Good luck!<\/p>\n

     <\/p>\n

    \"Mt.
    Mt. Fuji beneath an autumnal\u00a0maple.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

    I\u2019m on facebook at:\u00a0https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/zachbarnesonwriting<\/a><\/span><\/p>\n

    And Twitter: @ZacharyBarnes4<\/span><\/p>\n

    Like or follow me if you enjoy\u00a0the blog!<\/span><\/p>\n

    \u2013<\/span><\/p>\n

    Don\u2019t steal\u00a0my words. \u00a0They\u2019re mine. Zachary Barnes 2016\u00a9<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    I’d like to bring your attention to Komatsu’s last line, which I believe to be the best: “What you can eliminate from fiction is the description of things that most readers have seen.” <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":823,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"amazonpipp_noncename":"","amazon-product-isactive":"","amazon-product-single-asin":"","amazon-product-content-location":"","amazon-product-content-hook-override":"","amazon-product-excerpt-hook-override":"","amazon-product-singular-only":"","amazon-product-amazon-desc":"","amazon-product-show-gallery":"","amazon-product-show-features":"","amazon-product-newwindow":"","amazon-product-show-list-price":"","amazon-product-show-used-price":"","amazon-product-show-saved-amt":"","amazon-product-timestamp":"","amazon-product-new-title":"","amazon-product-use-cartURL":"","amazon_featured_post_meta_key":"","_amazon_featured_alt":"","amazon-product-template":"","_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0},"categories":[2,26],"tags":[55,59,60,88,94,106,169,204],"aioseo_notices":[],"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":85,"url":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/2015\/02\/03\/review-of-glen-cooks-black-company\/","url_meta":{"origin":752,"position":0},"title":"Review of Glen Cook's BLACK COMPANY","date":"February 3, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"This book moves. It's unapologetically fast, and there's momentum in every scene. If you like that sort of thing, you'll probably enjoy THE BLACK COMPANY by Glen Cook. So, for whatever reason my most recent post replaced this one... \u00a0Anyway, you can still find the review below. Firstly, this is\u2026","rel":"nofollow","context":"Similar post","img":{"src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1065,"url":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/2016\/05\/02\/co-authorship\/","url_meta":{"origin":752,"position":1},"title":"Co-Authorship","date":"May 2, 2016","format":false,"excerpt":"When someone asks for \"description,\" do you answer with \"leave nothing to the imagination?\" Well, as you may know, this isn't too classy, and although some folks may enjoy that, most probably don't.","rel":"nofollow","context":"In \"Advice\"","img":{"src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":137,"url":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/2015\/02\/19\/review-of-steven-eriksons-gardens-of-the-moon\/","url_meta":{"origin":752,"position":2},"title":"Review of Steven Erikson's GARDENS OF THE MOON","date":"February 19, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"This is a tricky review for me because I absolutely love this series (books 2, 3 and 4, specifically). But I didn't love it at first. In fact, I had a pretty hard time getting through it. So here's the deal: if you read this, you need to treat it\u2026","rel":"nofollow","context":"In \"Book Reviews\"","img":{"src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=752"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/752\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=752"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=752"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/zacharybarnes.us\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=752"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}