WHAT'S ON YOUR DESK?

  SUE GUINEY

    I’ve always loved these sorts of articles. I love to see how often my own neuroses overlap with those of other writers. They do say that you can tell a lot about a person from the way she works and what she keeps around herself. That sort of pop psychology is always fun but, I confess, more so when you’re applying it to somebody else. So, I promise to tell you the truth about what I see when I walk into my office, but then I’ll leave the analysis up to you.

     The first thing to note is that I have an office at all. I come from that long tradition of “kitchen table” writers – women who sneak their writing in between loads of laundry and stirred stews. But I promised to be honest, and so I must admit that back when my kids were smaller and I didn’t have a space of my own, my writing happened not in the kitchen but on my bed, knees up with a board across my lap. Say what you will about time, but some things do get better with its passing, and one is that the kids do grow up and move out and you can turn their bedroom into an office. Now every morning I walk up the stairs and open a door to my own room (unless some son has come home for a bit and I’m back to my laptop on the bed). Here’s what I see:

     My lovely white MacBook perched on its metal stand in the middle of the desk, with a bookstand to its right holding whatever I’m working on at the moment. I never learned to touch type, so after years of bending my head down to look at the keyboard or read from a notebook, my neck and shoulders tightened up like boulders. But these computer and bookstands are neck-savers, and I heartily endorse them to you all. To the right, at the end of the desk, a simple black telephone which I have difficulty not answering. And to the left – a stack of notepaper in a lovely green holder pretending to be a leather edition of Robinson Crusoe that a friend gave me for my birthday; a small red stapler; 2 jars of paper clips; 2 containers full of pens (one round, one rectangular); a water bottle; a coffee mug from the Writers’ Retreat in Ireland, Anam Cara; a bag of bull dog clips that are too large to be of any use but which only cost 50 p so I had to buy it; a stack of writing magazines and literary journals waiting ever-so-patiently to be read. Everything is neat and tidy on the right, a structured mess on the left.  Hmm...

      On either side of the desk, which is a built-in affair, are two attached bookshelves so they feel like extensions of the desk itself.  This time, the right one is messier. On the bottom shelf I have 2 wire in-boxes where I put stuff to be looked at and remembered but which I rarely look at or remember. Next to those are my most important references – my Times English Dictionary and my Roget’s Thesaurus. This thesaurus has been with me since University and I can’t do anything without it.  I used to think that using a thesaurus was cheating, but then I was told that the art comes not in keeping the entire language in your head, but in choosing its words well. That still makes sense to me. Next to the thesaurus is The Norton Anthology of Poetry (4^th edition). Its purpose is two-fold, to keep me humble, and to give me something to steal from.  And in front of it all is a stack of postcards announcing the launch of my first novel, Tangled Roots.

     The bottom shelf to the left has a small printer, slow but reliable, and an engraved portfolio (another gift from a friend). Piled on top of that are early drafts of my current project. Leaning up against the printer is a copy of The Riverside Shakespeare which is so large and heavy it can’t fit anywhere else. 

     Rising above both those shelves are my books and “knick knacks.” These might be the most interesting of all. In front of a row of back issues of literary magazines are stones collected from beaches in West Cork and Martha’s Vineyard.  In front of the row of poetry books are some more stones and a beautiful wooden seated Buddha I bought in Cambodia. The top right shelf has more poetry books, plus some old copies of The Writer’s Handbook in front of which is a wire sculpture of a woman sitting in a chair, reading.  The bookshelf on the bottom left has books used for research – books about physics and Russia which helped me write Tangled Roots.  Crammed in next to those are the start of the collection of works about Cambodia, which is the setting of the novel I’m working on now. The bookshelves above hold reference books on the craft and experience of writing, collections of short stories and plays, and assorted other works I’ve used and loved in the past.  Lying against those, rather helter skelter, is an old framed stained glass of Alice in Wonderland from when I was a teenager, a photo of myself and friends from Anam Cara, and a small stuffed cat given to me on opening night of Dreams of May.

     And what do I look at when I raise my head from my desk?  A corkboard full of the history of my life in writing: rejections, acceptances, other peoples’ business cards, quotations scribbled on bits of paper, cards from students, a newspaper clipping of Fidel Castro and Jimmy Carter playing baseball, a handwritten letter from the actress Fiona Shaw complimenting me on Dreams of May (!), and the Certificate of Incorporation of the arts organization I founded to find and launch new artists called CurvingRoad.

     And that’s everything. Quite a lot, really. And it makes me realize not only all that I still have to do but, even more importantly, all that I’ve already done. The rest I’ll let you analyze.

Though born and raised in New York, Sue Guiney has lived in London for nearly twenty years where she writes and teaches fiction, poetry and plays.  Her work has appeared in important literary journals on both sides of the Atlantic, and her first book, published by Bluechrome Publishing in 2006, is the text of her poetry play, Dreams of May.

Her first novel, Tangled Roots, is being published this month, also by Bluechrome.
 

THE MARTIAN CHILD
(2007)

Written by:
Seth E. Bass
Jonathan Tolins


Starring:
John Cusack
Bobby Coleman
Amanda Peet


A science-fiction writer
 adopts a hyper-imaginative
boy who says he's from Mars.

 

SAY WHAT? Misused Words

Elicit - to call forth, draw out or provoke.
     "I had no idea my little speech would elicit such a response."

Illicit - not sanctioned by custom or law; unlawful.
     "At a distance, she not only excused illicit love, she positively envied it."

A MOMENT IN THE HISTORY OF WRITING

In 1920, a newspaper reporter fell off a horse and wound up in bed. More than a little bored, she searched for something to do during her convalescence. Her husband, who had been bringing her library books, suggested she write her own book. He then bought her a Remington typewriter. 

The ex-reporter thought long and hard about the topic she should pursue. She remembered the stories that had circulated throughout her family over the years, and settled on one set in the 1800s. 

But she felt ashamed of the quality of her writing, and kept the project to herself. No one, and she meant no one, would read it! 

A visiting friend, who happened to work at a publishing house in New York City, discovered portions of the novel around the house. Back at work, she told her boss about it. During a scouting trip, he met up with the ex-reporter and grilled her about the book he knew she had written. 

She denied any knowledge of it.

On his last day in town, he again ran into her. This time, she sat in a car with friends who were shocked to learn she'd been writing a novel.

“How strange you’ve never said anything about it," said one friend. "But really, I wouldn’t take you for the type to write a successful book. You don’t take your life seriously enough to be a novelist.”

That hurt. She went home, gathered the manuscript, packed the pages into a suitcase and drove to the hotel of her friend's boss.

“Take it,” she said, “before I change my mind.”

He gladly accepted the manuscript. Over the next few days, he read it. He loved it. 

And the secret was out.

Margaret Mitchell's Gone With The Wind was on the brink of selling more copies than any other novel in the history of publishing.

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