Script Tease. Eric Nicol
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because it includes u. (A little orthographic joke, there. We’ll hurry on.)
The best-known Canadian humorist to achieve wealth, as well as fame, was Stephen Leacock. Leacock profited so handsomely from work like his Sunshine Sketches of a Little Town that he was able to give up his day job as a McGill University professor to concentrate entirely on making Canadians laugh — a feat previously thought to be impossible.
Today most publishers are leery of humorists because humour may be used to suggest that a sacred cow is yielding bullshit. Thus the market for humour in print has shrunk with the gelding of Punch and the bloated state of The New Yorker without Robert Benchley, James Thurber, and S.J. Perelman. Only Dave Barry survives, by the sheer weight of giggles, and he may yet be targeted by the CIA.
A pity this; in earlier times the only member of a powerful king’s court who could imply folly was his clown. Not sure you will look good in motley? Take heart from Woody Allen, the humorist who added a new dimension to appearing dishevelled. Woody is the role model for the neurotic image that people find hilarious.
Does this mean that if you suspect you lack the vital neuroses, you should forget about writing humour? Probably. But there is always the chance that life will deal you a blow you can see the funny side of. If necessary, go into politics.
INCOME TAX RETURN
This form of fiction may be safely ignored by most writers. Tax-wise, their earnings put them in a bracket that is off the wall and in the basement.
However, in the blissful event that your novel hits the bestseller list or your screenplay is honoured at an Academy Awards ceremony, it is prudent to keep a written record of all deductible expenses. Does this mean having children? Only if you are terminally fertile. Dependents are the most costly type of tax deduction. Especially if your children are over forty and living at home.
Tax-wise, it is better to have a liver transplant than to have children (liquor is deductible if used to research a project).
While using your creative imagination to prepare your tax return, it is wise to remember that the Receiver General can be a severe critic. His unfavourable review of your work could include a cash penalty and possibly a jail sentence. Yes, your new computer may be deductible if used for something other than browsing the Internet for porn. But the trip to Tahiti to research a book on Paul Gauguin’s use of native girls may not survive scrutiny (unless artfully woven into a travel narrative).
So, with math skills unequipped to deal with numbers over ten, it may be prudent for the writer, in the unusual circumstance of his having earned money, to have his tax return prepared by a tax accountant. One who is willing to do the job in return for having his car washed.
Now that you have chosen the kind of creative writing you wish to do, and written it down as a reminder in case you start to drift off into doodling or worse, what gear do you need besides the stout eraser?
A computer. As mandated earlier in this lecture, this has to be the most important relationship in a writer’s life. Yet, and as incredible as it may seem to us today, much of our past literature was created without the aid of a computer. Writers such as Shakespeare, Samuel Johnson, and even Charles Dickens wrote what they did with no laptop other than the one made when they sat down. What they wrote was not by the grace of Bill Gates. So how did they do it and still produce very acceptable written work?
Examination of old manuscripts — from the Latin words for “hand” and “written” — reveals that all of this peerless material was written with pen and ink. Yes, they didn’t even have a ballpoint to chew. Writers had to dip their “pen” — often little more than a turkey feather renamed “quill” — into a bottle of murky liquid. Dozens of times a page. The quill had no delete button. This meant that the writer had to think before he wrote. Otherwise the page looked really messy, which is the main reason why most of the early writers were monks depending on divine guidance.
Now, some antiquarians argue that handwriting gave the writer the feel of the words he was using, the rhythm of a sentence, the concerto of the paragraph.
Twaddle! Writers were composing on the typewriter — a clackety device with no warning of misspellings — for years without loss of lyricism or other ill effect except the increase in alcoholism.
True, there is some clinical evidence that it is prudent to write a first draft in pencil, then transfer the text to the computer. Reason: the computer has been known to lose an entire novel. A critique, perhaps, but one that the writer didn’t ask for.
Most writers prefer to go straight to work on their computer, right after checking their email. (Reading email and feasting on spam —the gratuitous messaging from persons or humanoids to whom we haven’t been formally introduced — can occupy a writer fully until it is time for a coffee break).
The distraction of email, along with surfing the Internet, enables the writer to delay, or possibly avoid entirely, the serious work of composition. It is possible to email the same information to hundreds of people — family, friends, even total strangers — which is a level of market saturation the writer may never match with his other written work. His reward is, of course, not financial but the gratitude of the email recipients, who read it as an excuse for delaying or avoiding their own work.
It is conservatively estimated that email, worldwide, eliminates more millions of hours of useful toil than any recreation since the golf course.
It is normal to fake indignation at having our time wasted by persons to whom we aren’t related by blood or natural bonding. A writer may actually go straight from his email to creating a graphic scene of murder, or sadistic sex, with renewed zest.
Another reliable source of distraction is your printer. This device has come a long way since William Caxton, in fifteenth-century England, created a new source of typographical errors: printing. Today’s home printer has vastly increased the number of ways in which something can go wrong. It also vomits paper at a rate that is accelerating the deforestation of the planet. Most of these pages are blank, for reasons known only to the printer, and of course the printer repairman, who has replaced our other relationships.
As for your copier/fax machine, forget about sex — this is the only reproduction you can afford.
Now that you have defined what kind of writing you would like to do and bought the hardware necessary to this mission, where is the best place to perform the actual act of composition? Not everyone can afford the luxury of a private study guarded by a sign on the door: NO ADMISSION! GENIUS AT WORK!
If the writer is fortunate enough to have an actual desk in his home, with a bottom drawer to accommodate all amassed rejections, he has no excuse for using it only as a footrest. A chair that swivels in response to any interruption of work is optional.
Only very successful writers who can afford the vasectomy or hysterectomy to eliminate the possibility of intrusion by children can count on prolonged seclusion for intercourse with the Muse.
Locking yourself in the bathroom with your laptop is feasible only if other