Yeah right

 

Just sit down and bat it out. You know the theme and the plot-theme. What's the matter with you? Did you forget how to write? C'mon, you know how to write! You've done it plenty of times, a million words, dozens of situations and characters. Quit stalling. Set a page margin, pick a font, and start writing. You know what the first scene is. You know what's next. Just wing it. Keep going until you hit the second act pivot. Organize your notes and write a nice first sentence.

 

No thanks. It's not an ordinary story. Can't improvise a thousand pages, making it up as I go along. I need an outline that makes sense, every chapter, every page.

 

Oh, sure, yeah, right. Then you can write it like a robot, huh?

 

Shut up! I know what I'm doing. I don't have a satisfactory view of the third act. It's all fuzz. It could be anything, and it has to be an original statement, or it's not worth attempting. Nothing to do until I know the ending as well as I know my own hands, heavy cutlery, a medium rare ribeye and baked potato.

 

What happened to being a "discovery" writer?

 

I'm trying to discover the ending. I don't want to triangulate it, and my personal situation is not the story. The main character not going to die on page 1000, so shut up and leave me alone. Jefferson did this, too, a dialogue between his Head and Heart, slightly florid and fluffy but it played okay in an 18th century moral dilemma. He didn't want to go home, fell in love in Paris. Not my problem. I hate Paris, and I don't want this novel to be Boy Meets Girl. It has to be something much bigger.

 

Boy meets elephant?

 

Shut up! I swan, half of me is a stand up comic. Seriously, music first, then story, remember? A solemn intermission to audition themes in my head. Blood Sweat & Tears. Zappa's Waka Jawaka. No, I need a symphony. Rachmaninoff's Second. The Who's bouncy Tommy. Two years of Steppenwolf before they quit, to the amazement and shock of Born To Be Wild fans. Who do I admire most above all else?

Another solemn intermission to let my heart speak.

 

It has to be male ... sober ... not Bonham and Page. Not Cocker, too conflicted and gravelly. A competent adult voice. Not a showman like Tom Jones or Sinatra. Brain power. Mancini's theme for Peter Gunn is in the right direction. Golden Earring's Twilight Zone worked perfectly for the climax of Escape, but I need something bigger and more complicated. The fictional composer who scored Chiseltown was brilliant, did the unexpected, a grandmaster of timing and discordant orchestral expressiveness.

What's the best thing I ever heard? ... 21st Century Schizoid Man by King Crimson. I used it as the track for my first festival gig, a long reel of experimental footage. Flip side, the medieval Court of The Crimson King, equally passionate. One LP and then they disbanded as far as I know. A real gem, 100% male.

 

Done yet?

 

Yes.

 

Fine, do the outline, turkey. Pick an ending.