Relatively Speaking

An old adage says “Everything is relative.”

Everyone stumbles across this one truth at some point in their lives. That is, if they’re paying attention.

If you’re paying attention, you’ll remember that to walk into a house heated to 65 degrees from an outside temperature of 32 or less feels like you’re walking into a hot house. Give yourself a couple of hours and the inside temps won’t seem so warm.

Place that same scene in the dog days of summer with outside temps of 100 degrees and walk into that same house set at 65 degrees. Suddenly one has walked into a meat locker.

Someone has undoubtedly thought of the analogy of “How do you boil a live frog?”

The power of relativity has come to bear on our lives so often that we seldom pay attention to it. We make our statements about conditions around us and move on to another distraction. It’s not something that seems terribly pertinent.

Why am I talking about such a petty little observation? Isn’t it the petty little observations to which writers must pay attention?

Whether a writer is dealing in fiction or non-fiction, it’s the details that will either set you free or bury you. If you’re working in non-fiction and you present one of those little observations of relativity incorrectly, credibility will be tainted. Precision of detail is critical in non-fiction. The writer cannot afford to allow relativity to color those details too much. Even memoir has its limits concerning relativity.

If the writer works in fiction, the relativity displayed by character and situation makes or breaks the reality of the story presented. If you have a character who hates feeling cold, who lives in the desert for that reason, for instance, her air conditioning unit won’t be set at 65 degrees in the summer. The character would never stand for a temperature setting that low. Yet, such a situation can be successfully used to further define the character’s individual needs, tastes, backstory, etc.

Some people call this perspective since relativity is reserved for a physics theorem. Regardless, writers deal with the continual relativity/perspective factor every day. Many times we do it unconsciously. Somewhere, on an intuitive level, we understand how critical it is that we appear authentic and accurate.

The genre dictates how we use this factor, as well. Children’s writers must write as adults. Their presentation of material or story, on the other hand, must be from the perspective of the readers’ age for fiction and use appropriate language level, etc. In non-fiction children’s age-appropriate language also holds hands with concept understanding and developmental stages. Targeting the proper age market for one’s work is crucial to success in that genre.

The same holds true for marketing any piece of writing to any audience. Relativity/perspective demands proper marketing for success. The writer of technical journals, for instance, targets only those who need that particular information, written at specific levels of expertise.

As you can see, everything is relative. From the content to the marketing the writer juggles accuracy with approximation every time she sits down at her computer, regardless of what she’s writing.

Maybe that’s a large part of why this industry is so fascinating and frustrating at one and the same time. If anyone has another take on this subject, let me know.  I’m always up for discussion.

Until later,

Claudsy

Headlines, Toed-lines, and the Gut

Curious or just confused?

Each day, whether delivered on the ether, on television, or in the daily paper we are inundated with headlines of things that happened near and far. What we do with those headlines is an individual choice.

Most people discuss the story and its impact, or the story and its cause. Implications run the gamut of pros and cons. There are those who obsess on the story, especially if it involves a celebrity. Some dismiss the news almost as soon as it’s been heard.

On the sidelines sits the writer. Headlines represent a wealth of story ideas, research possibilities, and general interest. So many gems of plot potential exist in the average bold print of the front page, including those headlines that mislead the reader in some way. If you don’t believe me, watch Leno for his take on headlines. He tantalizes his audience once a week with bold-print words from local papers sent to him by viewers.

Okay, that takes care of headlines. How about those toed-lines? What’s a toed-line, you ask. It’s the line of distinction a person doesn’t cross for the sake of self-interest.

Remember those headlines mentioned about celebrities? Here’s an example of how someone couldn’t toe the line.

It was reported this morning on Yahoo! that CPS visited Mariah Carey when she and her husband brought her new twins home from the hospital. It had been reported to the agency that drugs and alcohol had been used in the hospital room after the birth of the twins. Is the allegation true? No. It’s believed that a chance remark made about beer and breast milk production by someone in the room had been overheard and misinterpreted by a passerby.

The headline, to be sure, impelled any reader interested in the entertainment industry to read further. Yes, readership of the magazine increased, but to what end? Money? Perhaps not. What did the good-Samaritan receive for making the accusation? Self-satisfaction, maybe?

The magazine checked the facts. The person who began the story by reporting a falsehood to CPS obviously didn’t check those facts before jumping to a misjudgment and creating the subsequent distress for new parents and their families. In the end it’s unimportant that this happened to celebrities.  

What’s important about this story is that it happened to any new parents. For the average new parent, it’s unlikely that a national magazine would investigate the truth of the allegation. Instead, lives would/could be permanently damaged, if not destroyed.

Us Magazine toed the line. The accuser didn’t. What about the writer who reads this story for an explanation of that headline?

This is where the gut comes in. Here’s a fantastic opportunity for an article, story, or book. There are slants, angles, and genres waiting to be utilized for such a juicy premise. Women’s fiction, horror, non-fiction expose, and YA fiction all vie for possible avenues of use.

The Gut tells the writer whether to use the story, how much of it to use, the angle, slant, etc. that will work the best for whatever purpose desired. That gut reaction depends on the writer's moral stance, experience, and preference. It also depends on timing. If the need for extensive research exists for a proposed use, the writer may choose a quicker use for the information.

I’m not interested in using this premise. It’s not my kind of story. There are many writers who would take it and run with it, though, and rightfully so. It has potential to become a winner.

This example helps define what I call Headlines, Toed-lines, and the Gut. More potential material exists in the daily headlines than any writer has a right to expect. Choosing to use them requires thought and discretion much of the time. Without fail, the Gut will tell the writer what to use and how to use it. All the writer needs is trust in her personal choices.

Tell me how you choose a storyline. Share how you decide when to use headlines in a project.

Until later,

Claudsy