Novel Writing

"Announcer:     And now it's time for Novel Writing, which today comes from the west country on Dorset.

Commentator:     Hello, and welcome to Dorchester, where a very good crowd has turned out to watch local boy Thomas Hardy write his new novel "The Return Of The Native", on this very pleasant July morning. This will be his eleventh novel and the fifth of the very popular Wessex novels, and here he comes! Here comes Hardy, walking out towards his desk. He looks confident, he looks relaxed, very much the man in form, as he acknowledges this very good natured bank holiday crowd. And the crowd goes quiet now, as Hardy settles himself down at the desk, body straight, shoulders relaxed, pen held lightly but firmly in the right hand. He dips the pen...in the ink, and he's off! It's the first word, but it's not a word - oh, no! - it's a doodle. Way up on the top of the lefthand margin is a piece of meaningless scribble - and he's signed his name underneath it! Oh dear, what a disappointing start. But his off again - and here he goes - the first word of Thomas Hardy's new novel, at ten thirty-five on this very lovely morning, it's three letters, it's the definite article, and it's "The". Dennis.

Dennis:     Well, this is true to form, no surprises there. He started five of his eleven novels to date with the definite article. We had two of them with "It", there's been one "But", two "At"s, one "On" and a "Dolores", but that of course was never published.

Commentator:     I'm sorry to interrupt you there, Dennis, but he's crossed it out. Thomas Hardy, here on the first day of his new novel, has crossed out the only word he has written so far, and he's gazing off into space. Oh, ohh, there he signed his name again.

Dennis:     It looks like "Tess of the D'Urbervilles" all over again.

Commentator:     But he's...no, he's down again and writing, Dennis, he's written "B" again, he's crossed it out again, and he has written "A" - and there is a second word coming up straight away, and it's "Sat" - "A Sat" - doesn't make sense - "A Satur" - "A Saturday" - it's "A Saturday", and the crowd are loving it, they are really enjoying this novel. And it's "afternoon", it's "Saturday afternoon", a comfortable beginning, and he's straight on to the next word - it's "in" - "A Saturday afternoon in" - "in" - "in" "in Nov" - "November" - November is spelled wrong, he's left out the second "E", but he's not going back, it looks like he's going for the sentence, and it's the first verb coming up - it's the first verb of the novel, and it's "was", and the crowd are going wild! "A Saturday afternoon in November was", and a long word here - "appro" - "appro" - is it a "approving"? - no, it's "approaching" - "approaching" - "A Saturday afternoon in November was approaching" - and he's done the definite article "but" again. And he's writing fluently, easily with flurrying strokes of the pen, as he comes up to the middle of this first sentence. And with this eleventh novel well underway, and the prospects of a good days writing ahead, back to the studio."

How to leave your husband

By making a classy exit, naturally...

"Forgive me and forget me as soon as possible. I am leaving you for ever. Do not look for me, it is useless. I have become a witch from the grief and calamities that have struck me. It's time for me to go. Farewell."

Margarita hung up, and here something in the next room hobbled woodenly and started beating on the door. Margarita flung it open and a sweeping broom, bristles up, flew dancing into the bedroom. It drummed on the floor with its end, kicking and straining towards the window. Margarita squealed with delight and jumped astride the broom. Only now did the thought flash in the rider that amidst all this fracas she had forgotten to get dressed. She galloped over to the bed and grabbed the first thing she found, some light blue shift. Waving it like a banner, she flew out the window."

Mikhail Bulgakov, The Master and Margarita

Morbid Literature

"For to read on needlessly is to risk contamination by a bad purpose of the second kind. The literature forced on high school students (who have long known how to read) inundates them with vulgarity and vice against which their meager adolescent minds can hardly stand. When confronted with the evils so pervasive in fiction, their inevitable response is to accept these values as true and then imitate them. The exposition of these horrors on the psyches of our young people can have no other effect but that of a viral contraction. Has not literature, when injected into our classrooms, proved thus far endemic? The alarming rise of street-urchin pickpockets has been directly attributed to young readers of "Oliver Twist" (by Charles Dickens) at Parkview High. The recent development of teenagers disobeying their parents, engaging in illicit rendezvous with forbidden lovers, faking their deaths, engaging in underage drinking of poison from each other's mouths, using "happy daggers" (and other illegal substances) and, in extreme cases, committing double suicide is certainly the outcome of entire freshman classes reading that burlesque propaganda of Shakespeare. English class, however, is not the only affront to decency in school today." Bradley Fisher

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