If I could...

[intim8]

When I read books or short stories, even by very well-known authors, I often think, "I could theoretically do that."

Not that I can, but if I put enough time and work into it, it isn't unattainable; I theoretically could write that well.

But then every so often, I run across something and I know, nope, never gonna happen. I will never write that well.

I never had occasion to read this before, only ever heard it, but now that I have... nope. That's beyond me. If I could paint half as good a picture with so few lines of prose - forget verse, making it rhyme and scan, just prose - I'd quit my day job this minute.

You walked into the party like you were walking onto a yacht,
your hat strategically dipped below one eye,
Your scarf it was apricot.
You had one eye in the mirror as you watched yourself gavotte,
and all the girls dreamed that they'd be your partner.

Well I hear you went up to Saratoga,
and your horse naturally won
Then you flew your Lear jet up to Nova Scotia
to see the total eclipse of the sun.
Well you're where you should be all the time.
And when you're not, you're with some underworld spy,
or the wife of a close friend.

...you probably think this song is about you.

If you don't recognize what that is from, well, get off my lawn you whippersnapper.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

I have similar thoughts as you do sometimes, although I really can't tell what it is that's so special about these particular lyrics. No offense, I simply don't see what you see in them.

 

[StillStunned]

I've mentioned once or twice here that I believe the essence of good Sword & Sorcery is an evocative opening paragraph. A few lines to set the scene. Often the background is just as much a character as the people in the story. I try my hardest in my stories, but this is the standard I aim for, and one I very much doubt I'll ever achieve:

Torches flared murkily on the revels in the Maul, where the thieves of the east held carnival by night. In the Maul they could carouse and roar as they liked, for honest people shunned the quarters, and watchmen, well paid with stained coins, did not interfere with their sport. Along the crooked, unpaved streets with their heaps of refuse and sloppy puddles, drunken roisterers staggered, roaring. Steel glinted in the shadows where wolf preyed on wolf, and from the darkness rose the shrill laughter of women, and the sounds of scufflings and strugglings. Torchlight licked luridly from broken windows and wide-thrown doors, and out of those doors, stale smells of wine and rank sweaty bodies, clamor of drinking-jacks and fists hammered on rough tables, snatches of obscene songs, rushed like a blow in the face.

- From: "The Tower of the Elephant", by Robert E. Howard.

 

[MelissaBaby]

You know that Nathaniel Ratecliff song where he sings, “Son a bitch, give me a drink?”

I could have written that.

 

[Thanatos_X13]

I felt that way reading China Mieville. His command of language and seemingly bottomless vocabulary is definitely beyond me. Plus, the dude is so inventive and creative. Same with Cormac McCarthy. Man was just a genius with such a unique and gripping voice.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

When I read books or short stories, even by very well-known authors, I often think, "I could theoretically do that."

Not that I can, but if I put enough time and work into it, it isn't unattainable; I theoretically could write that well.

But then every so often, I run across something and I know, nope, never gonna happen. I will never write that well.

I never had occasion to read this before, only ever heard it, but now that I have... nope. That's beyond me. If I could paint half as good a picture with so few lines of prose - forget verse, making it rhyme and scan, just prose - I'd quit my day job this minute.



If you don't recognize what that is from, well, get off my lawn you whippersnapper.

I agree. So few lines that really do paint a picture. It was a great song. No small wonder it's a classic, still talked about today.

 

[intim8]

No offense, I simply don't see what you see in them.

None taken. To me, the selection of such precise details, and so few of them, combined with the brevity of description, and that it paints such a complete picture of this guy in my head, that's the gold standard of writing.

Take 'apricot'. Maybe she just picked that because it rhymes, but it is the absolute perfect color for a 1970s rich playboy. It's a color that, in that situation, is almost garish in its studied subtlety and the fact that it isn't a "common" color that the little people would choose. And it took me a couple dozen words to say what she said in one.

 

[intim8]

one I very much doubt I'll ever achieve:

You came damn close with shopkeepers crying their wares and carters shouting for passage through the crowd.

 

[intim8]

You came damn close with shopkeepers crying their wares and carters shouting for passage through the crowd.

I don't remember your exact words, but if you had used "throngs" where I have "crowd", it might have put it over the top.

 

[SimonDoom]

With plenty of genre fiction, and some other more serious fiction, I often feel like with enough time and attention and editing help I "could" write something like that. But there are some authors that make me think, I could never write like that. They have a talent for putting words together that combines sophistication and a poetic sensibility that I just don't have. Joyce is like that. John Updike. Virginia Woolf. Cormac McCarthy. Vladimir Nabokov.

When it comes to popular song writing, like the Carly Simon song cited above, two songwriters that come to mind are Paul Simon, who I think is the greatest poet among modern popular songwriters, and Elvis Costello, whose wordplay is extremely clever. I could never write song lyrics the way they do no matter how hard I tried. And they both did it so young.

 

[KeithD]

I have similar thoughts as you do sometimes, although I really can't tell what it is that's so special about these particular lyrics. No offense, I simply don't see what you see in them.

You have to sing them in your mind.

"You're so vain, I bet you . . ."

 

[StillStunned]

I don't remember your exact words, but if you had used "throngs" where I have "crowd", it might have put it over the top.

I'm pretty sure that "throng" makes any sentence better. It's a good word, and one I'm going to start using more often.

 

[gunhilltrain]

When I read books or short stories, even by very well-known authors, I often think, "I could theoretically do that."

Not that I can, but if I put enough time and work into it, it isn't unattainable; I theoretically could write that well.

But then every so often, I run across something and I know, nope, never gonna happen. I will never write that well.

I never had occasion to read this before, only ever heard it, but now that I have... nope. That's beyond me. If I could paint half as good a picture with so few lines of prose - forget verse, making it rhyme and scan, just prose - I'd quit my day job this minute.



If you don't recognize what that is from, well, get off my lawn you whippersnapper.

That's Carly Simon, and she may have had another singer in mind - possibly Mick Jagger, I've heard. Not trying to knock Simon, but rock singers (and rappers, maybe) sometimes write about what it's like being a rock singer. Maybe because so many of them hit the top so early in life, before they've had any other experiences?

Song writing has some similarities to other writing, including poetry, but it's not identical. Without the music, the lyrics are lacking something. If you are awed by poets, can you equal William Blake, T.S. Eliot, Emily Dickinson, and many others?

 

[StillStunned]

That's Carly Simon, and she may have had another singer in mind - possibly Mick Jagger, I've heard.

I thought it was supposed to be Warren Beatty?

 

[intim8]

she may have had another singer in mind - possibly Mick Jagger, I've heard.

I always heard it was Warren Beatty.

She's never said, probably to not give him the satisfaction of knowing that the song really was about him. It must be torture for a guy like that to think one of the most famous songs in pop music history might not be, and she twisted that knife in the chorus.

 

[gunhilltrain]

I thought it was supposed to be Warren Beatty?

I think I've heard that one too. Maybe she didn't mean any specific person, maybe it's a "collage" of different guys. (There is a better term, but my memory keeps failing me.)

Worth noting that most of Emily Dickinson's poems were not published during her lifetime. No one really knows why, but it's possible that she was not interested in "feedback." It's difficult to make comparisons, but that is different from having a contract with a major record label. Publishing existed in the 19th Century, but mass culture as we know it now didn't exist. Lit is sort of in the middle because we are not getting paid, so no one is going to "drop" us if we are unpopular. But I'd still define most online sites as part of mass culture.

P.S. A "composite character," that is the term I was looking for.

 

[lovecraft68]

When I read books or short stories, even by very well-known authors, I often think, "I could theoretically do that."

Not that I can, but if I put enough time and work into it, it isn't unattainable; I theoretically could write that well.

But then every so often, I run across something and I know, nope, never gonna happen. I will never write that well.

I never had occasion to read this before, only ever heard it, but now that I have... nope. That's beyond me. If I could paint half as good a picture with so few lines of prose - forget verse, making it rhyme and scan, just prose - I'd quit my day job this minute.



If you don't recognize what that is from, well, get off my lawn you whippersnapper.

Love angsty female anthems. But I don't think anything can top Morrisette's "You outta know." That is pure artistic venom.

 

[Trionyx]

There is one author here whose ability to craft beautiful sentences is way, way beyond my skill set. While the stories are fairly straightforward and perhaps even predictable, I read them mainly to enjoy their skill with the language.

So, no, I could not theoretically write as well as they do.

 

[lovecraft68]

That's Carly Simon, and she may have had another singer in mind - possibly Mick Jagger, I've heard. Not trying to knock Simon, but rock singers (and rappers, maybe) sometimes write about what it's like being a rock singer. Maybe because so many of them hit the top so early in life, before they've had any other experiences?

Song writing has some similarities to other writing, including poetry, but it's not identical. Without the music, the lyrics are lacking something. If you are awed by poets, can you equal William Blake, T.S. Eliot, Emily Dickinson, and many others?

I thought it was James Taylor? Trust me, that guy loves him some him.

 

[intim8]

There is one author here whose ability to craft beautiful sentences is way, way beyond my skill set. While the stories are fairly straightforward and perhaps even predictable, I read them mainly to enjoy their skill with the language.

So, no, I could not theoretically write as well as they do.

Do tell? I want to read them too.

Don't worry that they'll get a big head if they read this. They probably already do.

 

[mrs_mackenzie]

With plenty of genre fiction, and some other more serious fiction, I often feel like with enough time and attention and editing help I "could" write something like that. But there are some authors that make me think, I could never write like that. They have a talent for putting words together that combines sophistication and a poetic sensibility that I just don't have.... Virginia Woolf.

I came here to second Virginia Woolf. The Waves is the perfect definition of a book you need true genius to write. I pale by comparison, so I don't try to compare myself.

Agree with the genre fiction thing. I find chick lit and romance so frustrating to read because I think, I could do this but better, if I could apply myself and had time.

 

[Boobytrap73]

During all of the news stories about the solar eclipse, I had "You're so vain" stuck in my head. I finally got rid of it and now it's back. Thanks a lot.

~BT73

 

[gunhilltrain]

I thought it was James Taylor? Trust me, that guy loves him some him.

He could be in there, maybe. They got married the year the album came out. (Being seventeen at the time, I did notice that that her nipples were showing through her blouse.) Beatty was involved with her too at some point.

 

[AwkwardlySet]

You have to sing them in your mind.

"You're so vain, I bet you . . ."

Oh, I know the song, I just didn't find this particular depth in the lyrics. Don't get me wrong, they are nice, but nothing special, at least for me.

 

[Senor_Smut]

For me it's Catch-22 by Joseph Heller. I adore the novel, but it breaks my heart because I know that if I had a million years to practice, I could never write something that good.