The Jake of All Trades – Page 32

Ten Influential Books

Having been tagged by a few on Facebook, I am posting my ten influential books. I know you weren’t suppose to think about this much, but, as it will happen, as the meme went about Facebook, I of course thought a lot about this.

That being said, I could probably do this five more times with different books. When there are books like “The Hero and the Crown” and “The Last Temptation of Christ”, or “This Perfect Day” and “The Pillars of the Earth” all of which influenced me somehow.

Superman… something, Saves the Day, maybe? This was a kids picture book… more importantly, it was MY picture book. I remember the bad guys had back pack helicopters. It was the first thing I read, first by memorizing all the words, then by actually reading them. Everything else started here.
Raise the Titanic, Clive Cussler – Another milestone. I read this in fourth grade, it was my first full sized, adult novel. I had to ask my mother what damn (dam-en) was. Nerd fact: I read this book before Ballard found the Titanic, spawning years of interest in the subject. (Yes I saw the movie opening night, no I am not ashamed)
The Chronicles of Narnia, C S Lewis – These were the first books I ever read twice. Such a thing seemed foreign to a kid… I mean, I already read them! Voyage of the Dawn Treader is still my favorite of the bunch, and I am still pissed about what happens to Susan.
The Nine Billion Names of God, Arthur C Clark – There were some Sci Fi before this, but this was really my introduction to short stories as well. This collection, sort of a “Greatest Hits” for Clark is just filled with so much great stuff. For anyone wanted to write short stories, of any genre, this book is a valuable resource.
Cosmos, Carl Sagan – What can you say about this book? It had planets in it! We had NatGeos showing us Jupiter and Saturn as I grew up. This book opened my eyes to the solar system, and to the universe beyond.
The Keep, F Paul Wilson – My first horror novel. One of my mother’s favorite books, it has been read quite a few times before I tried it. Around sixth grade at this point, and for the first time became afraid of the dark.
Advanced Dungeons and Dragons Players Handbook, 2nd Edition – I had gotten into fantasy, reading Terry Brooks, Eddings, even getting into Dragonlance books. This book, the rule set for the AD&D game did something else for me. It set me free. Now I wasn’t just reading stories, I was actively participating and creating them. This book brought me friends, adventures and countless hours where my parents had no concern at all about me, because I was playing D&D.
Dune, Frank Herbert – This is my favorite novel. Half fantasy, half sci fi. Throw in some philosophy and big ass worms. I think the thing that got me about this is how rich and alive the whole book feels. Nothing is shallow, each character or clan or house has a history. One of the few books I have read several times. Herbert’s prose is near poetic at times, and has been a bar I’ve strove to rise to.
Carmina Catulli (The Poems of Catullus) – This was my text book for Latin V. I translated poem after poem and fell in love with not only Catullus, but poetry itself. While there had been poetry before, some I still love, no book has had more of an impact on me as a writer than this.
The Afterimage, Phillis Levin – By now I am in college, and there were certainly a pile of books that had gotten into my head up to this point. I was given this book by a teacher in my first poetry composition class. Found out Phillis taught at the college, and wanted to be good enough to be in her class. These poems are beautiful and thick and Phillis’s command of the English language is still something that I admire. If Catullus’s book bore a poet from me, the Afterimage was it’s bearing, it’s guidebook.

bonus:

Alice in Wonderland – I have never read this book. I own at least 5 copies in various bindings, and yet, I have never traveled front to back between any of their bindings. And yet still, Alice remains one of the most influential stories in my life. I love it. I’ve seen any movie, any cartoon, love video games and artwork, I’ve read re-tellings. Somehow, despite the unmarked spines of the editions I own, this book fascinates me.

Markdown, File formats and a new way of working

I have grumbled, if you will, in the past about my workflow. Specifically my concerns have been with file formats, having almost lost my entire back log due to outdated file types.

After that I changed to RTF, using that as my primary file container. It worked, and aside from annoyances on my computer, I had no issues… UNTIL I wanted to edit them on my phone. Apparently RTF cannot be edited on a mobile device easily.

Recently I’ve made a new switch. This time I have switched to Markdown. What is markdown? Well, what it is not is a new file format. It is a way of writing that stores the basic formatting needs inside of a text file.

For example: if i wanted to make something italic, I simply surround it in asterisks, such as *this* (which turns into this). Similarly, bolding is two asterisks, like **so** (and so)

And some other things too, such as links and images. An advanced form called MultiMarkDown includes tables and footnotes. All of this is stored in a simple TXT file.

Why is that important? Because I can edit a TXT file anywhere. My workflow has now freed itself of the specific program I am using, and allows me to use any and all of my devices for writing and editing. Also the files are small, just in case that was a concern.

So, how? I’ll not go through everything, but let’s touch on some of the big points.

Dropbox

Dropbox is my cornerstone, at this point, and I am not sure how I managed without it. (Mostly I used zip disks and thumb drives, actually, but you know what I mean…)

All my writing goes here. It is backed up online, on all of my devices, accessible on my phone.

ByWord

ByWord is the app that started all this mess. It is a distraction free writer app, first for the iPhone / iPad, and then later came out with a Mac edition. It uses Markdown for formatting, and provides a clean, simple way of writing. Files are saved as .txt files in dropbox and boom, available everywhere.

And, since they are TXT, using them doesn’t eat into my monthly bandwidth on my phone.

I use it to write, take notes and edit on my phone and computer seamlessly.

DayOne

DayOne is my journal. This was another app offered up by Apple promotions that I grabbed. At first, I simply played with it… but then!

What is it? It is a journalling app. Not a note app, though you can certainly use it that way too. Rather it is designed to put in entries based on a calendar.

For my, I used it most at first by simply logging the events of my day at the end. Sometimes with pictures. Then I started taking memorable pictures I wanted more context with and adding them.

Journalling each day is good for us as writers, and I found myself using it more and more, adding in little notes for ideas and such, eventually deciding to use it for blog entries as well.

DayOne uses XML as its base file format, but the formatting is still MarkDown. XML is still text based, so you can get in there should DayOne go away.

Other Markdown

I use markdown now in my WordPress blog, making it easier to go from DayOne, or ByWord to post (like I did with this post, DayOne -> WordPress). I have fallen for AirMail, a Mac email client that too uses Markdown as an option, allowing me to format emails quickly and nicely. I’ve added Write App to my tool box, because it allows for easier navigation of multiple files.

I’ve even started a CMS (content management system) that allows straight markdown files to be used for content, instead of a database (why? because I am a geek, that’s why)

So give it a shot, this Markdown tutorial let’s you play with syntax! Later, I’ll write up how I use these tools for my specific workflow.

Poetry, Emotion and Editing

We often associate poetry with a more pure out pouring of the mind, or soul, than other forms of writing. For this reason, most who approach it tend to link the work emotionally with themselves.

The result can be an over weighing of comments, criticisms and reactions to the work, since the work is seen, not as it is–a piece of art–but rather the person themselves.

In this, it is often difficult to approach younger poets about there work, as I have found. Some will take any writing advice with the wrong heart.

One of my writer friends is fond of saying “we bleed on the page,” which I think is a good analogy.

We have to dig inside for these things, whether we are writing a poem about our past, a fictional character, drawing on forgotten fears–we dig, deep. That is only part of the creation.

The words on the page are now their own, they stand or fall now independent of the person. The poet needs to treat them, to honor them, as such. A poem about the last moments of your Grandmother’s life deserves the same editorial afflictions as one about a flower in a field. The personal matter–while important to the creation of the work–cannot be a roadblock to its maturation.

A first draft is owed a critical eye on diction, structure–an eye on the art, not the moment that birthed it.

So take that emotion and do what you will with it–bleed onto the page. But remember, when the blood dries, it is no different than any other ink. Take from it art that is full alive, that stands on its own right.