Unlike the time I used a deckchair as a toilet, fully clothed, in front of my then-girlfriend’s parents, I don’t remember where I was when somebody gave me a copy of the Hitchhiker’s Guide trilogy. But I remember reading it.
The thing with Douglas Adams’ writing is that you laugh the first time round, and spend the second and third and fourth reads feeling really mugged off by him — his syntax and phrasing; his set-ups and his pay-offs. By the fifth read, you have to give it away and let someone else enjoy that first time. It’s not just that he’s good – better, even – or that he walks a line halfway between accessible and untenable. It’s because while you sit there, picking your nose, his writing goes and shows you how much fun you can have with words.
Mainly, Douglas Adams says you don’t have to sit and splash your crime novel over a thousand Post-Its before you write it. He’s saying you don’t have to worry about resolution or structure or theme – his stuff reads like he knows, eventually, that these things appear anyway. His writing says, listen, if you’re bored of what you’re writing, you might as well just stop — because no bastard’s going to enjoy reading it. His writing says, why even bother with the boring bits?
Some of this is why I probably won’t read And Another Thing, Eoin Colfer’s installment, and the sixth of the trilogy. Not because I’m a purist, or because I dislike his writing. Not because it’s an insult to Adams, to canon or to even writing like Adams. I probably won’t read it because in the time since I opened The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the way I read has changed. Because now I’m writing myself, I’ll analyse everything, pull it to bits, like always. Because nothing’ll recreate that buzz I had on realising that you could write long stories without boring bits. Because it won’t be new.
Because a few years later, I’m trying to write long stories without boring bits, and it’ll anyway feel like that fourth read-through.
___
Photo credit: k621 @ flickr
Selfish reasons for not reading Eoin Colfer’s ‘And Another Thing’
Unlike the time I used a deckchair as a toilet, fully clothed, in front of my then-girlfriend’s parents, I don’t remember where I was when somebody gave me a copy of the Hitchhiker’s Guide trilogy. But I remember reading it.
The thing with Douglas Adams’ writing is that you laugh the first time round, and spend the second and third and fourth reads feeling really mugged off by him — his syntax and phrasing; his set-ups and his pay-offs. By the fifth read, you have to give it away and let someone else enjoy that first time. It’s not just that he’s good – better, even – or that he walks a line halfway between accessible and untenable. It’s because while you sit there, picking your nose, his writing goes and shows you how much fun you can have with words.
Mainly, Douglas Adams says you don’t have to sit and splash your crime novel over a thousand Post-Its before you write it. He’s saying you don’t have to worry about resolution or structure or theme – his stuff reads like he knows, eventually, that these things appear anyway. His writing says, listen, if you’re bored of what you’re writing, you might as well just stop — because no bastard’s going to enjoy reading it. His writing says, why even bother with the boring bits?
Some of this is why I probably won’t read And Another Thing, Eoin Colfer’s installment, and the sixth of the trilogy. Not because I’m a purist, or because I dislike his writing. Not because it’s an insult to Adams, to canon or to even writing like Adams. I probably won’t read it because in the time since I opened The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, the way I read has changed. Because now I’m writing myself, I’ll analyse everything, pull it to bits, like always. Because nothing’ll recreate that buzz I had on realising that you could write long stories without boring bits. Because it won’t be new.
Because a few years later, I’m trying to write long stories without boring bits, and it’ll anyway feel like that fourth read-through.
___
Photo credit: k621 @ flickr