Pasha Malla spoke at Jan 16, 2010 Humber Writers’ Circle
I am going to try to keep this posting about yesterday’s Humber Writers’ Circle brief as there are more important things to be reading – it is estimated that 200,000 people could die as a result of Haiti’s earthquake, the worst in 200 years. As an individual donating money, it is important to make sure to give to registered charities who are earmarking funds for the earthquake, as this is one of the criteria for the Government of Canada to match the funds up to $50 million.
I first discovered Pasha Malla on Terry Fallis’s blog a couple of weeks ago – they had been reading at a literacy event together. I just loved his writing in McSweeney’s , and had intended to search Pasha out as an author to interview. I was therefore rather pleased to realize that he was speaking at yesterday’s writers’ circle (which I had signed up for many months ago).
Pasha Malla read from his book of short stories, The Withdrawal Method and described how his career as a writer developed circuitously from childhood – when Pasha was five, he was already writing stories in his journals! While in film school, Pasha discovered that he was more interested in depicting scenes in words rather than images. Pasha also spoke about the importance of connecting with other writers, as he did through a writing program at Concordia.
Alex Shultz of HarperCollins Canada and Kim Moritsugu, author of four novels, conducted the flash assessments of manuscript first pages. Alex Shultz specializes in literary fiction and has edited Jane Urquhart and other notable authors. These are my random notes of the kinds of things he looks for in a manuscript: originality, a fresh voice, a convincing voice and a vivid sense of place and character. It should be free of cliché and memorable – the kind o f book that makes you want to talk to someone else who has read it. He is looking for a writer in complete control of what they are doing – genre does not matter. The way he put it, “If they are in control, I will go where they are taking me.” He gave the following tips:
- make sure your manuscript looks like all the others, so the focus is on the words on the page and not the page itself
- print it double-spaced (could maybe be 1.5-spaced but definitely not single-spaced),12 point, Times New Roman (no fancy formatting)
- eliminate typos and grammatical errors
- read books about style and grammar and apply them
- put away your finished manuscript for a few weeks and then come back to it with fresh eyes
- read it out loud and listen to how it sounds – by doing this, you will hear stumbles in rhythm and inconsistencies in tone.
There was quite a bit of discussion of “voice” and what is meant by this. It was recognized that it is hard to define, and harder to learn. The general consensus was that a writer needs to have an original voice as a writer and narrator; must be able to get into the character and hear the individuality of how the person expresses themselves. The voice needs to be consistent and reflective of how real people talk. I now think I need to take another look at The 29th Day to see how I can make my narrator’s voice more consistent – apparently, first person narratives (such as the one I am attempting) are very hard to do well.
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