Done With Chapter 3

These pieces are not my best work. They are poorly written, sometimes unclear, with poor punctuation. As a diary entry, I don't spend more time than necessary on them.

One of the most important lessons I learned from a mistake made in chapter two and practiced in chapter three is don’t rush the ending. The avant-garde format found in chapter three may be avant-garde for screenwriters but it’s not so avant-garde for writing in general since I just copied the format I saw is Shakespeare’s first folio. Leonard Bernstein said of Beethoven that form was everything. I can’t say for sure exactly what Bernstein meant but the way I understood it is the way I have applied it. Format has been everything in this project so far and it has been most important in this chapter. The two-inch margin space per column is very little so not all words can fit, the syllable count has to be 2 and then 3, the entire block of dialogue cannot be more than 7 lines (35 syllables) or 14 lines (70 syllables), and each line has to be five syllables; in the third column, the action lines cannot be more than 4 blocks of three lines with a two line closer for the first two boxes, and then 3 blocks of four lines for the last box. A thing can be said in many different ways but there is a right way to say it, there is a right word to use and I do not always get it right but I do strive for that. The right word depends on your format. That is how I use format, at least. Another thing about format, I do not prescribe these rules before hand. I didn’t know before writing chapter three that I would like to write every line as five syllables, I didn’t know I would like to have everything on one page, I didn’t know any of these rules but through a natural process of discovery, these rules became apparent and then my guidelines. Chapter four will have new rules of its own.

Bernstein also says that every note is the correct next note for Beethoven as if he had a telephone to God. This is exactly what I strive for in my work. Throughout writing, I keep reminding myself, I am looking for the right next note, I just need the right next note, all I need is the correct next note. Before, I hadn’t heard the word Bernstein used which is ‘inevitability’. In other words, there couldn’t have been another note, there had to be this one and only this one. Bernstein comments on Beethoven’s process and remarks how agonized the man was, how he ‘wrecked himself and his life’ to achieve this inevitability. While I keep myself calm and composed throughout writing purely because I enjoy it so much and need to sustain myself, I now have a new fear that I am wrecking my life striving for an inevitability in my work that won’t be celebrated until after I am dead or at all. In this life, I will ruin my chance of marriage, children, financial success, the ability to take care of my parents in their old age, and so much more if I continue on this process. It’s a fear with a chance.