Thesis and Class Excitement!

Geez Louise, it's been another month since I posted.

HOWEVER, it has been an extremely productive month! I've been meeting with my playwriting/thesis advisor weekly, which pretty much means I get my world rocked by his wisdom and suggestions every seven days. Seriously- he's opening this play up for me in ways I don't know if I ever could have conceived. The first two acts of SOTM are now totally different and I'm really happy about that. I've cut a few scenes, added a few more, and rewritten the scene I've hated for two years to the point where I almost love it.

The biggest difference is that it is no longer a children's play in any way. This is startling to me, and surprisingly so; I knew it wasn't for little kids, but I figured it could still be considered TYA (Theatre for Young Audiences.) In fact, recently I've been asked by several people if it is and I've always said yes. But no more. Of course, my advisor says it's never been a kids' play; if it were, I'd have to take all the crazy asylum stuff out, which I don't want to do, and now that I've added some other things... I've written an adult play. WHOA. Rachel, the YA writer, has written something for adults. What is this madness?

But when my other thesis advisor, the one who's overseeing all of us theatre seniors, asked me what I thought about this change, I said, "I was never setting out to write a children's play. I was setting out to write a play." Which is true. I just want to write something good and moving.

And while I don't think that this play is Pulitzer-worthy, or even submission-worthy at this point, I do have a fan. I asked two recent graduates from my university to direct, and the first one who answered seemed pretty interested. I sent him the play around 11:30 one night, and he had read it and e-mailed me about it by 9 am the next day... saying he loved with the play, that he thought it was beautiful and had a mature voice. I was ecstatic, and it's going to be fantastic to work with someone who's just as excited as I am. Right after the director had agreed to direct it, I got a response from the other guy, one of my friends, who was all about it, too, but I told him that the director had gotten there first and was very enthusiastic.
To be honest, I kind of thought I would get someone who was like, "All right... I'll direct this college's kids reading... blahhhh," but instead, both the candidates I asked were really nice and great about it, and it's just awesome to have gotten such a fantastic response.

The reading is scheduled for April 23rd, but a month before that, I'm having a private reading, which was cast this week. Hopefully hearing the play in people's voices will give me an idea of the changes that need to occur and also what works, before I present it to a bigger audience. A month is not a long time to make thohttp://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifse changes, but hopefully I can do it.


Also in writing news, my Poetry & Fiction II class has been going swimmingly. My first critiqued piece wasn't so great, but I think I've redeemed myself with my last two, which have both gone over very well. I just got back from having my third piece reviewed, and at the end the professor casually mentioned that that should edit it and send it out. Maybe I just will...


Also, shameless plug: I mentioned my collab blog last time, and it's been doing really well! Come on over and read it!

Good News of the Day!

Yes, I have been gone for longer than anticipated again, but I return with three pieces of good news!

Firstly, if you've been reading this blog for a bit, you may recall my mentioning a sci-fi novel. At one point it went by the the title Quarantined, which was then shortened to Q and then I abandoned that title altogehter when neither of those fit what the story had become. For probably about a year now, it's simply been known as The Untitled YA Sci-Fi Novel. And as of yesterday, The Untitled YA Sci-Fi Novel was completed.

Of course, I use the word completed lightly; this draft is finished. But I'm really happy about this. I've been working on this novel on and off, and then consistently this year, for over two years. I made a mess of it in November and spent the last two months cleaning it up and finishing it.

I hope to get a NaNo reviewer go over it and get some feedback, then work on it some more!

Bit of News #2 is that my friend and critique partner Stuart have started our collab blog. It is a writing blog, including book reviews, and we've gotten great reception so far. Check it out here!

And Bit of New #3 is that my final semester of undergraduate (and possibly all, but never say never) education is upon me, which means that I will be completing my senior thesis. My thesis is a new draft of my play, Straight on 'Til Morning, culminating in a staged reading of it. My playwriting professor has offered to be my mentor and I'm really excited. I'm meeting with my thesis teacher tomorrow to discuss the details and I really can't wait to meet up with my mentor on Wednesday. I'll keep you posted on how it goes!

NaNo and a World Premiere

I'm still here, I promise. My life has been ridiculously busy. The world premiere of the play I'm in happened on Thursday night and I have my fifth show of the week today. This play is one of the best I've ever been in- possibly *the* best- and working on it has been the most amazing experience of my life. But I'll get to that in a second.

If you're wondering what happened with me and NaNo- I won! I nearly dropped out a few times; rehearsals and schoolwork were keeping me really busy, but I just have to win now that I have twice before. So I finished with a little over 51,000 words.
I'll just reiterate the tip I gave in the last entry: DO NOT do NaNoEdMo. It completely destroyed my novel and I think I'll have to do a complete rewrite. It just takes your mind to the complete wrong place when you're writing and editing at that speed. Next year, I'll be doing NaNo the traditional way.
When I have time, I also need to check out what's up with my word count; Scrivener says I only have 32,000 words, but that's impossible since I had 33,000 words before I even started NaNo. Thankfully, I have this novel backed up several times. I learned my lesson from the Great Word Loss of NaNo '09.


Now back to the play. As I believe I mentioned, it's a brand new play written by a very young playwright, a recent graduate. However, her credits are quite impressive, and I'll admit to being sort of star struck whenever I saw her (which wasn't often before this weekend, as she lives in New York and I'm in Philadelphia.) Even though she's only two years older than I, I always felt like a little kid around her because I was so intimidated by her credits and her writing skill. Last night, however, I got up the courage to ask her about something mentioned in her program bio: being produced at the Actor's Theatre of Louisville. I happen to be looking there to do an apprenticeship, and who better to talk to about it than someone who's already done it?
As it happens, she hasn't done it; her friend did, but the playwright's work was the one the friend produced. But with that one question, doors were opened. Besides being introduced to the friend when she comes to see the show next weekend, it also finally started up the conversation that I've been longing to have with the playwright about playwriting in general. She's such a nice person and I very much enjoyed talking to her. She asked me if I wrote too, and when I told her I did and gave her the plot of my play, she said she'd love to read it! That was a "whoa" moment for me, and now I'm nervously looking over my most recent drafts to make sure they're not embarrassing. But what an opportunity!

The process of working on this play has been nothing but inspiring to my own playwriting endeavours. When next semester starts, I expect I'll be writing a lot more, as my play is my thesis!

Blehhhh

The title is probably as articulate as this entry is going to get.

I'm at the "talking to myself" point in editing this novel. There was one time this afternoon when I just threw up my hands and cried "WHAT IS GOING ON?!" at the computer screen (but really at myself.)

My novel needs sosososo much work. Last night, I spent hours making this:

It's a timeline of all of the events in TOSOL, because the more I read through it and the edits, the more I realise the problem is that I write out of order; times don't line up. And while it is definitely a fixable thing, it's going to be really hard and take a long time. I want to cry. The only thing that's keeping me working on it is the love for this novel, even if I do feel like I hate it right now. I can't believe I let it be seen in a state that was even worse than what I have now. Ughhhh.

I'm just having major writing frustrations right now. It's not just the novel. I didn't win ScriptFrenzy. I petered out at 69 pages, mostly because the plot didn't have enough to it; what I do have is a lot of repetition. This is okay- it's the same problem I had with my first NaNo. You just have to learn how to do it. But I feel like a little bit of a failure for not finishing, and as much as I repeat to myself that the only person I made a promise to was myself, I still feel a physical weight over not finishing.

And then there's my other play, SOTM. I feel guilty for not working on it for a month or two. March was taken up with essays and April was filled with travel, but why am I not devoting time to a play that takes place in London while I'm in London? My time here is running out (only a little over a month left- eeee!) and I want to apply the atmosphere here to it while I can still feel it around me.

Basically, all there is is frustration right now...

Rejection Numero Dos

I wrote about how my PP play was not chosen for this year's school season, and that same play just got its second rejection. This time, though, I think I know why.

My mom sent me an e-mail almost two months ago with a scanned attachment. It was an article from my local paper at home announcing that a theatre in my home county was taking submissions of pieces by poets, playwrights, and the like for a festival. This was already enough to get me interested, but the article went on to say that this festival's focus was on work that was inspired by other writers' work; the submissions didn't have to fall into this category, but those that did would be given more consideration.

I got very excited. I am a playwright, if a budding one, and my play was a piece directly influenced by J.M. Barrie's novel and play. Perfect!

I sent off the current draft to my critique partner, asking him to get it back to me a few days before I would have to send it off to the committee for perusal. This way, I figured, I'd have time to adjust at least a few things. He complied a few weeks later, I edited, and then off went the e-mail to the theatre.

A response came back almost immediately- I hadn't filled out a form. This was because they hadn't mentioned a form in the advert, but I filled it out and sent it off. Another response came, this time asking if my submission was a full length play. They weren't sure how they'd do with that- they had been looking for shorter pieces, like monologues and poems. What did I expect if my piece were to be chosen?
This irritated me a bit. They hadn't specified what kind of pieces they wanted. If they had only wanted short pieces, no way would I have submitted my ninety-three page script. But I did not show this irritation. Instead, wrote back and said that even a staged reading would be wonderful.

The decisions were made earlier than was expected and I got my "thanks, but no thanks" e-mail on Wednesday. It wasn't unexpected- I knew from the second e-mail, the one that mentioned the length, that my piece wasn't right for the festival. There are also a few other reasons why there would have been small problems. For example, they wanted the playwright/writer to come to dress rehearsals and things like that, which I would normally love to do, but would have been unable, as I'm still in England then. So while it may have been the writing that drove them away, I'm hoping it was one of those issues.

I think my mom was more disappointed than I was that it hadn't been accepted. When I told her the news this afternoon, she started listing other theatres that I should send the play to. I love that she's so supportive, but I know that the play still needs some work. Just as with the school submission of this play, I didn't have enough editing time and had to just send off the copy I had at that moment. To submit it to other theatres, I'm going to need to work on it much more, and I'm happy to do so. I love the play and one day, when it's truly finished, I hope to see it onstage.

Knowledge, Or the Lack Thereof

I have lately been experiencing the above conundrum in two of my current works, and it's difficult to work my way out of these states.

First, Knowledge.

I like to research. I am that nerdy girl at school who practically clapped when a research paper was announced. I do super in-depth dramaturgical work when I'm in a play... sometimes for every character or situation presented. Sometimes, my research goes horribly awry, like when I was collecting facts for my 2009 NaNo novel, Remembrance. I sent it away to be edited by a friend, and when it came back, she had noted that most of my research was incorrect. All of my hard work was for nothing, and now I had a very mistaken point of view of English history. Other times, I simply know too much-I research to the point where what I know about the subject can't possibly be worked into the manuscript, especially in a natural, non-info barf-y way. This is an issue I came across recently, when I decided to write my analytical essay for class on my favorite play and its film adaptation, which I also love. I re-read the play, watched the film, collected sources, and wrote ten pages of notes. The essay was only allowed to be 2,500 words wrong and by about 2,000, I had only talked about three of my points and hadn't needed to use a single source because I had so much to say on the subject in the first place.

This latter problem is what is going on for one piece, in a way. When I began writing my Peter Pan play, I waffled about whether to send my main character, Mary, to an insane asylum. As I started doing more research in about February of last year, I came to learn that in Victorian England, seeing things and talking too much about things that people don't want to hear merits you a one-way ticket to a nice padded cell.
I worried that this might be too dramatic and waffled for about six months as to whether to put it in or not. In the end, I decided that she would be sent to the asylum but skipped over the actual asylum part. leaving off when she found out she was being sent away and picking up when he returns. When I presented my semi-finished script to my playwrighting class around November of last year, my teacher specifically requested that I write a scene in the mental institution.
All through this, I had been thinking of doing so, if only for myself, and had been doing research. I learned a lot. A lot, a lot. My entire perception of the medical world in the Victorian era was changed because of the methods they used to cure women of the disease my character was thought to be suffering from (hysteria, the catch-all diagnosis for all inconvenient behavior in the 19th century.) I wrote the scene. I turned it in. I was happy with it.
Then I came to England and started a class called Madness and Medicine in Modern Britain. The class specialised in the examination of asylums in the Victorian era, with a unit devoted to hysteria. I read a dozen articles on it, covering them in highlighter. I took detailed notes during class. I gave my own presentation on hysteria. Then I went back to my script, armed with my new knowledge. Then I realised something.

I knew too much. There was no possible way I could go deep enough into the subject in two or three scenes without making it unnatural and/or confusing a potential audience. I needed to, not dumb it down, but keep it simple, on the surface. Let the audience know what the disease was and the milder ways it was treated (some of the more serious treatments not only shocked me and would be hard for me to write about, but there's no way my fourteen year old character would have been subjected to that... I hope.) However, it's been difficult for me to pull back and see just how much is too much to be dumping on the audience.


Then there's the problem at the other end of the spectrum: too little knowledge. This problem came in when I was working on my NaNo '10 novel, which I've been editing since December.
See, in the novel, my character has a boyfriend. The first time they get together in a romantic way, they kiss pretty seriously to the point where my main character gets uncomfortable and leaves. However, she does let herself get carried away before realising what she's doing.
Yeah... like I know what that's like. Besides not being great at writing kissing scenes- I've only ever written one, and it was more of a very chaste kissing moment- I have little personal experience with the act myself. I've never gotten to the point that Lyddie does in that scene.
I wrote it early in the process and when I shared it nearly a year later, people seemed to think it was realistic. But reading it over this week, I realised that it wasn't serious enough. While the reader knew that she was getting uncomfortable... there were really no details and so they just had to take my word for it, and I don't think that would satisfy many people. That's the problem with this being a novel and not a screenplay. I've written screenplay/play kisses and it looks like this:

(They kiss.)

I can do that (unless I'm the actor carrying out the direction, which I have been. Then I'm just as inept.)
In a novel, especially one being told in first person present like mine... you need more than "he kisses me" (well, at least for this scene. I do in fact have a few more, no-details-given kisses in the book.)
I wanted to add more but what? I didn't know what would go on in a situation like that. So I spent some time on the romance boards of NaNoWriMo.org, consulted my favorite book series, and added a bit to the scene.
I'm happy with how it stands right now, but I honestly don't know if it's realistic, and unless I find a lovely English boy who will love and care about me, I don't anticipate getting any real-life experience in the near future that would help me confirm it.

*sigh*

In Which I Recognize That I Am a Baby

I mentioned a few blog posts back that I got some great, helpful feedback from my playwrighting professor on my adaptation. I am excited to apply them... but I am also being a complete baby about it. I enjoy editing, and I feel very accomplished when I've completed a lot of little changes. For example, in my fiction, I have the tendency to just use "says" and "asks" rather than more vivid verbs. This was one of my frend's biggest comments on Remembrance. So I went through The Other Side of Light and highlighted every single one, then took a few days to go back and "vivify" them. It took a long time, but I know my novel's better for it.

But the changes that need to be made on Straight on 'Til Morning are not small. It's almost like an overall rewrite is due- my scenes and dialogue are fine, but it's so all-talk, no-action that I pretty much need to rework every scene in some little way, as well as add one or two more that are more swashbuckling.

When I bring up my document and face the title page, however, my brain just throws a tantrum. I'm not quite sure how to make a lot of these changes, as all-talk, no-action is my weakness in all writing... and possibly my life :p I want to make them because this play will not sit in my desk drawer for the rest of my life... but it's definitely going to be hard.

This weekend's a writing weekend, though- I have to finish up three shorter papers and then I'll turn my attention to the scritpt. We'll see how this goes.

In non-whiny, cool news, the First Novels Club is holding an awesome contest! Check it out!

Activating

When I got my (great and very helpful) play evaluation back on my Peter Pan play, one of the biggest notations was that a lot of the scenes were all talk, no action. They were full of smart dialogue... but no one ever did anything. And as I was writing scenes for a different play I'm working on, I noticed the same thing. I really liked what was being discussed, but they just sat on the couch and talked.

So I wrote to my teacher and asked him if he had any suggestions to liven up the action. He gave me a few suggestions and I'm going to try them as soon as I get these darned reviews written for my Reading Theatre class.

This is when I wish I had my arsenal of plays with me. Sadly, I only brought three (Proof, Time Stands Still, and Leaves.) The good thing is that they're all talky plays, so I'm going to scour them for ideas as to how to get my characters up and moving.

Any suggestions from my fellow writers?

Rewriting! And... GO!

Since I am now free from school (though only technically for a little over a week- then I leave for England and my university orientation there), I have been doing a lot of writing. Last night, I was reading over Q, which I haven't worked on in earnest for awhile, and tweaking a few things. This afternoon, I finished editing another NaNoer's novel (all 248 pages of it... oy) and began a second tonight. And on Christmas day (if I can), I will start looking at my own NaNo novel, The Other Side of Light. I'm really excited to get back to it.

This morning, I went online to check my grades (four A's and one B, the latter in a class I hated and thought I was going to fail, so yay!) Besides the happy fact that two of the A's are in my writing classes and my P&F teacher said he doesn't usually give out A's, I was pleased to find my revision letter from my playwrighting teacher in my inbox.

The letter itself is three pages long, single-spaced, which is lovely. Because while it is full of hard truths and suggestions for improvement, I didn't turn this script in thinking it was perfect and I want suggestions because I want to do something with this play. Additionally, the fact that he wrote so much means that he was willing to consider it for that long, so I'm thrilled.

A lot of the suggestions are going to be really hard to work- they're going to require a lot of thinking about the play from new angles and rewriting scenes I love the way they are currently. But while a part of me cries at the thought of doing this, another part is happy that I'm already at the stage where difficult questions can be asked and that the letter didn't simply read, "Learn how to spell and then we'll talk," (as I suspect some of my classmates' may have.) And what better place to start my revisions than England, the setting of the play? These rewrites are going to be very difficult, but I am determined to be triumphant!

Oops...

Sorry for the lack of updates... and there will be no WIP Wednesday today, either, as finals are killing me. I've never had so many papers due (it's about five or six of varying length... ugh.) The only reason why this is even being written is because I'm stuck in the basement of my school library while I scan the many, many pages of my playwrighting and writing journals for my teacher. It is tedious work.

But in good news, I finished the first draft of my Peter Pan play... and now it even has a name, thanks to my friend Caleb. I'm calling it Straight on 'Til Morning. It runs at eighty-five pages, currently. I had to do an incredible amount of research for a scene that I never even planned on writing. At first, I was just doing the research for myself for background information. But then after my class suggested I write at least one scene in the asylum (a.k.a "sanatorium"), I needed to go even more in-depth. And now not only can I not stop because it's so interesting, but new stuff is popping up every day- or maybe I'm just noticing it now. But suddenly, people are blogging about this topic, plays are being produced about it, and there are new websites every day. Very interesting- and very helpful!

Now that my scans are done, I suppose I should go back to my room and actually write these three last papers *cries*