“HOUSE OF CARDS”

I confess. I’m addicted to the Netflix show ”House of Cards.” Like millions of other viewers. I’ve devoured season two and am awaiting the yet unfinished third season.

Since I usually discipline myself not to get hooked on any series, I wonder about my fascination with this one. It’s true that the acting is excellent, the dialogue clever, and the fictional (?) machinations in Congress mesmerizing to those of us disgusted with the Washington scene.

Yet I would guess that the show’s popularity lies in something else. I think my co-addicts and I are fascinated by any character who refuses to be defeated, though you would shudder at having the live prototype in your life. Frank Underwood, the ruthless anti-hero of “House of Cards” and his equally amoral wife Claire never give up no matter what obstacles are placed in their path to power. A crucial Senate vote that goes against them? Allies who become enemies? A president who catches on to Frank’s schemes and bars him from White House meetings? Wouldn’t these cause any normal person to concede defeat? Not the Underwoods. They keep going, literally over dead bodies, because their aim is as focused as a light beam that never turns off.

On the other hand, how often does a rejection letter from an editor or a coldly formal response from an agent make us give up? Easy to succumb to the defeatist belief that our work isn’t good enough to be published. The standard advice is “keep submitting.” The dictionary informs us that the first meaning of “submit”“ is to “yield to the authority of another person.” What we forget is that the editor/agent/publisher rejecting us often reacts from individual feelings we know nothing about, and that may not be any measurement of our work.

The first short story I wrote was rejected 28 times. Yes, I gave up — who wouldn’t? (The Underwoods for one – or two.) Fortunately, a much more successful writer informed me that 28 rejections were nothing. “I’ve sent out some stories fifty times,” he said. Disbelieving, but ashamed not to try, I sent my story out again. On that 29th time, it was accepted.

As writers, we don’t have to be as ruthless as the characters in “House of Cards,” but we do need their kind of ironclad belief that ultimately our efforts will pay off. Though they only will if we get that manuscript off our desk and bravely send it out into the world again — and again.

I await further reinforcement from Season Three!

WEBSITE: www.annehosansky.com

BOOKS: “Widow’s Walk” – available through iUniverse.com; “Turning Toward Tomorrow” -Xlirbis.com; “Ten Women of Valor” – CreateSpace.com and Amazon Kindle.

Since “David Copperfield”  rates  high on my list of  favorite books, I’ve always enjoyed the story of how Dickens  created  the character of Dora,  David’s first and very childlike wife. Apparently she was based on a woman Dickens was angry at, because she had rejected him.  He made  Dora a caricature of her –  shallow, silly, immature. But life and readers have their own views. To Dickens’ chagrin, readers adored Dora and found her far  more charming than the saintly heroine. The point is that you  never know what will happen if you use your writing as  a means of getting even.

When I began writing my memoir “Widow’s Walk, ” I  was faced with the challenge of what – and who – to include or diplomatically soften.  I was gentle with a number of people, but not with one. A relative, she had  treated me callously just weeks after my husband died, when I was still vulnerable.  I wrote a precise description of the ugliest incident.  Frankly, I hoped this would show the world  what she had done to me.

However, revenge can boomerang in a court of law. Cautiously I showed  my manuscript to a lawyer who assured me what I had written was  miles from being legally malicious, compared to other  books. Still, he said, it would be safest to change the woman’s name. I took his advice and had fun doing it, for the name I chose was Vella.  A savvy niece caught on right away.  Reading the published book she not only recognized the woman but said, “Vella is for villain, isn’t it?

I  also edited the  confrontational dialogue to soften it.  I realized by then there would be more triumph in writing a good book, than in using it as a tool for revenge.

Even without wielding a pen (computer) as a weapon, I constantly find that writing out my feelings of anger  or grief in a journal enables me to walk freer of them. So although Dickens failed in his get-even attempt at making Dora ridiculous, I like to think that he enjoyed writing about her  and worked off his pain with his prolific pen.

WEBSITE: www.annehosansky.com

BOOKS:
“Widow’s Walk” – available through iUniverse.com;   “Turning Toward Tomorrow” -xLibnris.com;   “Ten Women of Valor” – CreateSpace.com and Amazon.com.  Also Amazon Kindle.

REMEMBERING STANLEY HOCHMAN

The publishing world has lost a highly regarded figure. I’ve lost an incomparable friend. Stanley Hochman — esteemed translator, editor, author — died August 10th of what’s called “natural causes.” As if it’s natural for all that talent and intellect to vanish.

Through the more than 40 years that I knew him and his wife Eleanor (known to us as Lee), Stan was an encyclopedic store of literary references and witty anecdotes. When I began writing, he encouraged me and often said  (half teasingly) he admired the stubborn way I plowed on through countless rejections. He claimed he didn’t have that persistence, never once flaunting the dozens of books he had produced.

Those works spanned several areas. For one, there are his myriad translations, both fiction and nonfiction. Fluent in French and Italian, he tackled the first English translation of a work by Brancati, “Bell Antonio.” His translation – with Lee – of Zola’s “Germinal” is considered the standard. On a more contemporary basis, he was asked to translate a novel written by famed French film star, Simone Signoret (“Adieu, Volodya”). This resulted in an anecdote he relished telling us about. He’d had a phone call from a woman with a husky voice and French accent. “This is Simone,” she began. Stan was so certain it was a hoax that he almost hung up. Fortunately, he didn’t, for it was, indeed, Signoret calling from overseas to tell him personally how much she appreciated his skillful translation.

An avid movie fan, he compiled the first volume of a “Library of Film Criticism” under the title “American Film Directors.” It’s fascinating to read how differently various critics view the same film.

Then there are his dictionaries. Stan researched and edited “Yesterday and Today: A Dictionary of Recent American History. “ It was published in 1979 , but  events continued to unfold so quickly that,  along with Lee, he updated it to “A Dictionary of Contemporary American History: 1945 to the Present.” Time and tide don’t wait for authors, so four years later he had to update this dictionary, too. (He complained that he’d be updating for the rest of his life!) I’m fortunate to have copies, for the dictionaries were an invaluable resource when I was writing novels that take place in the 1960’s and ‘70’s.

Stan claimed that serious books  don’t tend to bring in as high royalties as, say, chick lit. To prove it, he concocted a mischievous plot. Together, he, Lee and a friend named Molly wrote a romance novel under a pseudonym. Being Stan, he couldn’t resist the chance to add a sly dedication: “To Molly, Lee and Stan, without whom this book could not have been written.”

As he ruefully told us, sales from that book brought in far more money than from his translations. (So much for Zola!) He and Lee went on to write several more romance novels.

In Stan’s later years he said he was through working, but again his literary sense of humor won out.  With obvious relish, he edited “Foul and Familiar: A Dictionary of Very Improper French.” “Improper,” indeed, for it’s pornographic! (For the curious ,it’s available through Amazon, as are the dictionaries.)

Statistics rarely convey the person behind the facts. Stan was a loving husband for over 60 years, a doting father (of David) and grandfather (Daniel and Joel), a gourmet cook (oh, those soufflés!) and a born student devoting many years to learning still another language, Japanese.

In the week since he died, I’ve heard many stories about his generosity and thoughtfulness, so I’ll share one of mine. When my first book was about to appear, Stan was too eager to wait. So he secretly asked the publisher to send him the page proofs. The first I knew of this was when Stan sent me a note to say he’d read the entire book in one night because he couldn’t put it down. For an anxious author about to see her first “baby” into the world, this was the validation I needed.

Unlike books, lives can’t be revised or updated. Stan will live on in the words he wrote and in the indelible memories of those of us who loved him.

Website: www.annehosansky.com
Books: “Widow’s Walk”- available through iUniverse.com; “Turning Toward Tomorrow” -Xlibris.com; “Ten Women of Valor” -CreateSpace & Amazon.com. Also Amazon Kindle.

Writing can take you to unexpected places, but I never thought it would land me on a horse that  has gold and silver sides.

I had decided to write a children’s book about a little girl’s trip  to New York.  What  could be more authentic than a ride in one of the famous horse drawn carriages?

I went to Central Park to view them for myself.     Horses decked out in colorful plumes, attached to ornate carriages..  But  I was uneasy.  Part of me agrees with the increasing view that pulling these heavy carriages hour after hour on concrete pavements is unfair to the animals. To complicate  matters, the new mayor – de Blasio – declared he would end these rides. Despite many people saying that  the carriages were  “too much a historic part of New York” to be eliminated,  I didn’t like the idea of  writing a scene that might make my book seem outdated.

What does a writer do in a case like this? The solution was to find an alternative. Would the Park’s famed merry-go-round – the largest in the country – be as exciting to young readers? When questioned,  my ten-year-old granddaughter enthusiastically declared that it would.

Since seeing is not only believing but leads to more vivid writing,  I went to Central Park to see the carousel for myself.  Standing in front all those  children whirling around on brightly painted horses,  I was back in my own childhood. How I had loved  riding the merry-go-round — up, down, around and around, fearlessly galloping across the plains, the wind in my hair, reaching for the brass ring (almost toppling off the horse).

The mature side of me asked the ticket taker journalistic  questions – how many horses (57), how long and expensive each ride, etc. But the child within me asked for something else: a ticket. I would ride back into my youth.

Not so fast!  To my embarrassment I was unable  to  get my considerably older body up on the horse. The assistant sarcastically informed me I had chosen the biggest one.

Finally climbing awkwardly (why had I worn a skirt?) on a smaller horse, I waited eagerly for the bell that would begin this journey back.  A bell clanged and music of sorts began, but somehow my horse didn’t seem to be moving up and down as high as I’d remembered. I watched his hoofs – yes, they were moving. But not the way they had when I was a  child.    And where was my brass ring? Nowhere in sight.

When I finally dismounted, the friend who’d  come with me asked if I had enjoyed the ride. “The horse didn’t move much,” I muttered. He assured me he’d been watching and that the horse did

But something was missing: the child who has galloped out of sight.

Fortunately, we can conjure  up our lost rides in our writing.

WEBSITE: www. annehosansky.com

BOOKS: “Widow’s Walk” – available through iUIniverse.com; “Turning Toward Tomorrow”- Xlibris.com; “Ten Women of Valor” – Amazon.com and CreateSace.com. Also Amazon KIndle.

In teaching memoir writing, I invariably find the Number One reason people want to write a memoir is to preserve memories for their children and grandchildren. Since they aren’t thinking in terms of best-sellers nor do they want to invest large sums of money, the solution is to create a do-it-yourself project.

That’s the route a Florida man took.

Warren Adamsbaum , a Boca Raton retiree, was a soldier during World War 11. A dutiful son, he wrote hundreds of letters to his parents to assure them, as he says now, “that I was OK.”

When he came home after the war his father presented him with an album in which he’d pasted every one of those letters. For years the album lay on a shelf, the pages beginning to crumble. Looking at those papers his late father had so carefully saved, Warren decided to put together a memoir that would “save the essence of those letters.” But he was perplexed about how to do it. A collection of them would have given the facts, but he felt there were too many mundane details. What finally came to his mind was an unusual format: Write about his experiences, interspersing selective letters.

He focused his memoir solely on the war years, 1943-1946. It took him several years to write and organize the manuscript, but what treasured – and even humorous- memories it conjured up, such as his mother’s guilty certainty that the stomach ailment he rashly wrote home about must have been caused by the tinned salami she sent him six months earlier! And dramatic images like marching into a captured German town and seeing white towels and sheets flown from every window as symbols of surrender. Adding copies of treasured items such as his Honorable Discharge, Warren ended up with more than 300 pages. He dedicated the manuscript to the memory of his parents.

Warren wanted the memoir to be shared only with family members and close friends.. Taking the pages to a local store he ordered 36 copies. The cost was a few hundred dollars, but the reward was gold, including praise from the sole war buddy he was still touch with.

“I worked hard and long,” Warren says “but I feel very proud of myself.”

There may be an additional reward down the line. Warren continued to be an avid letter writer, but the recipient has been his only grandson. The two live far apart, so Warren maintained a close bond via a multitude of letters and, later, E-mails. “I just learned that Andy has saved quite a few of them!” (A future family memoir?)

P.S. Do you have a story about writing a memoir? Let me know at ahosansky@gmail.com and perhaps you’ll see yourself here, too.

WEBSITE: www.annehosansky.com
BOOKS: “Widow’s Walk” – available through iUniverse.com; “Turning Toward Tomorrow” – Xlibris.com; “Ten Women of Valor: – Amazon.com and CreateSpace.com. Also Amazon Kindle.

“My savings banks.” That’s what Ralph Waldo Emerson called his journals. On a recent visit to his house in Concord, Massachusetts, I saw the circular table he used as a desk, with drawers built in all around it. That’s where he kept many of those ”savings banks,” daily records of everything that came to his encompassing attention. Emerson began keeping a journal when he went off to college (Harvard) at the precocious age of 14, and he kept them going for the rest of his lengthy life.

Inspiring, but not unique. In interviewing men and women around the country for a book I was writing about bereavement, I was surprised to find increasing numbers of people who regularly keep a diary. It’s especially utilized by those who are working their way through loss of one kind or another. As a Boston woman confided. “ I write down all the feelings that would shock my mother and the priest. Then I’m okay for the rest of the day.”

She was wary enough to hide her journals. So did a famous author – Edith Wharton. Circumspect in what she revealed to the world, she kept any passionate moments out of her autobiography. Yet after her death it was discovered that this very proper woman had a secret “Love Journal,” in which she recorded (among other things) an affair she had during her troubled marriage. ”I have drunk the wine of life at last,” she wrote. Apparently she had a need to preserve that “wine” on paper.

In teaching journaling and memoir writing I help my students use diaries to connect with themselves and to navigate through challenges. It’s thrilling to see them feel ncreasingly free to write about — and to share with the class – such personal emotions as love/hate (usually for a spouse or partner — or child!), and the balancing act of reverence/rage for a parent.

The journals also freeze in time experiences that might have been lost. A seventy-year–old woman told me of her regret that she had never kept a journal. “My younger self is lost to me now,” she said.

I had lost the habit of journaling for many years, but went back to it when my husband was diagnosed with a terminal illness. The diary enabled me – like the Boston woman – to express feelings I couldn’t share with anyone. My diary became a friend I could turn to at any midnight hour – and who wouldn’t betray my confidences! It also stored memories to draw upon when I began writing my memoir, “Widow’s Walk.”

[Next week, meet a Florida man who created an unusual memoir.}

Website: www.annehosansky.com

BOOKS: “Widow’s Walk” – available through iUniverse.com; “Turning Toward Tomorrow” – Xlibris.com; “Ten Women of Valor” – Amazon.com and Create Space.com. Also Amazon Kindle.

In a week overflowing with sugary reminders to pay attention to your mother, I confess to a secret abhorrence of Mother’s Day. I’ve now discovered I have surprising company – in the form of the very woman who created this obligatory holiday, Anna Jarvis.

In 1908, Miss Jarvis, who was childless herself, came up with the idea to have a special day to show your appreciation of your mother. She could have been a nifty PR woman, for she began a national letter– writing campaign that mushroomed into historic success.

However, as the saying goes, “Be careful what you wish for.” To her dismay, the campaign worked too well. Candy companies were quick to see how the day could sweeten their profits, florists bloomed with ads about proving your devotion the floral way, and as for greeting cards….! They probably constitute the weightiest mailing of the year, with the possible exception of Christmas. All this has resulted in a reputed $20 million annually spent by dutiful (cowed?) offspring.

Within a decade of starting what she intended as a simple commemoration, Anna Jarvis was enraged at what she called the “commercialization” of it. She voiced her outrage verbally and in newspapers via on-target comments such as: “Confectioners put a white ribbon on a box of candy and advance the price just because it’s Mother’s Day.”

Ironically, what was meant to delight mothers has put an emotional burden on them. Will they or won’t they receive tributes from their children? What if one child dutifully follows the rules and another child shuns the holiday? Does this prove that one loves you and the other doesn’t? (I’ve heard this lament from too many tearful mamas.)

This also puts unnecessary pressure on sons and daughters. Wire flowers? Take Mom to dinner? What’s enough — or not enough? In view of the Hallmark Holiday this has become, I applaud Ms. Jarvis’ advice to simply write a letter. “Any mother would rather have a line of the worst scribble than any fancy greeting card.”

Still, you better know your audience. A writer friend took hours to compose what she thought was a beautiful letter, only to have her mother ask, ”You couldn’t afford a card?”

In the complicated world of mothers and daughters, finding that right card can become a time -consuming challenge. I spent hours searching for ones that didn’t define my mother as a (fictitious) angelic being. I finally found the perfect card. In large letters it read: ”Mother, you made me what I am today. . . GUILTY!! “ I couldn’t resist buying that card, but  not to send! It’s a pertinent warning now that I’m a mother myself.

The mandatory hoopla also overlooks the obvious fact that if you genuinely appreciate your parent, you shouldn’t need a special day to tell her.

WEBSITE: www.annehosansky.com

BOOKS: “Widow’s Walk” – available through iUniverse.com;”Turning Toward Tomorrow” – xLibris.com; “Ten Women of Valor” – CreateSpace.com and Amazon.com. Also Amazon Kindle.

The literary world has become poorer with the loss of Gabriel Garcia Marquez, who died April 17th. I still remember how amazed I was by my first reading of “A Hundred Years of Solitude.” Magical realism was alien to me and it was a revelation to discover that fiction didn’t have to be ordinary facts pinned on the page like enbalmed butterflies, but could soar with the writer’s imagination into a space where reality had no relevance. For this would-be writer, such freedom was liberating.

Everyone who cares about great writing is familiar with this and other novels of Marquez’s, though less with his equally intriguing short stories. But what I am remembering are the inspiring ways he worked. In an interview years ago he revealed that he was working on a new novel, plus several short stories, plus a screen play! I envy that ability to – as we say these days – multitask. I find it hard to switch my focus the way he could, but it’s an ability worth cultivating. We all fall into doldrums when creativity is absent or feels forced, and it’s a life saver (career saver) to be able to switch to another piece of work during that time.

In his autobiography, cleverly titled, ”Living To Tell the Tale,” Marquez spoke of the “countless lures that tried to turn me into anything but a writer.” Unfortunately, many of us inflict these ”lures” on ourselves as excuses to postpone writing. I would hate to add up the hours I squander reviewing the latest posts on Facebook, LinkedIn, et al. These “lures” steal irreplaceable time from us unless we’re as vigilant about our time as Marquez was.

He preached the importance of avoiding “unnecessary actions” in stories , too. In some of the best advice I’ve ever read he stressed “reducing stories to their pure essence…deleting everything unnecessary in a forceful genre in which each word ought to be responsible for the entire structure.” I keep these words on the bulletin board above my desk.

One less generous thought about Marquez: he was lucky to be a man. I say this because ”Solitude” was reputedly written during 18 months of undivided time while his wife took care of the burdensome details of everyday life. In a dream world, we would each have someone selflessly dedicated to enabling us to do uninterrupted work. Is that wish magical (un)realism?

QUOTE FOR THE DAY:
“It is not true that people stop pursuing dreams because they grow old, they grow old because they stop pursuing dreams.”
Gabriel Garcia Marquez

Website: www. annehosansky.com

Books: “Widow’s Walk” – available through iUniverse.com;  “Turning Toward tomorrow” – Xlibris.com; “Ten Women of Valor” – CreateSpace.com and Amazon.com. AlsoAmazon kindle.

“Your submission doesn’t fit our current needs.”

How many times have we been given that message? None of us enjoys being rejected, but for writers it comes in routine doses.

Most editors and agents seem to have rote responses. “This manuscript isn’t for me, but another agent might like it.”

That makes me feel as if I’m in the middle of the ocean with no life preserver. Can you at least suggest that mythical other agent? Or tell me why it isn’t for you? Probably the agent/editor didn’t even get past the first paragraph..

We’re usually told to send the first ten or fifty pages, but want to bet nothing past page one gets looked at? I know a writer who inserted a small piece of paper into the middle of a chapter. Sure enough, when the manuscript was returned the paper was still in place.

Then there’s the impersonal form that states, “We know how painful it is to receive a rejection….” (Do you really?) And then adds, “carefully reviewed your work.,,. not a reflection of its quality…” ad nauseum. Condescending ? Yes. Helpful? No.

Years ago, I received a response from a magazine I won’t identify that had a formula check list of why a submission was rejected, ending with “What makes you think you’re a writer?” (Imagine how many suicidal thoughts that must have created.) Mercifully, that box wasn’t checked on my communication, just the “not for us” which seemed benign by comparison.
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Actually these form rejections, irritating as they are, are better than the manuscript that’s returned without any explanation. This once happened to me with no less a reputable magazine than the “Atlantic Monthly. Out of a masochistic desire to hit back I phoned to say, “I wonder if you forgot to include a message?”
“Sorry about that,” said a smooth voice.”But we can read the rejection to you.”
“Don’t bother,” I said. “I know it by heart.”

Increasingly rejections are accompanied by an invitation to subscribe to the magazine. I applaud the response used by a North Carolina writer, Stan Absher. Using the magazine’s postage paid envelope he sent the subscription form back with his notation: ”Your magazine doesn’t fit my current beeds.”
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It’s tempting to emulate him, him, but then again,you have to realize this may put you and your stories on some permanent NO FLY list.

The worst is when we reject ourselves. A friend recently told me, “Another rejection, I’m a failure.”

What we have to inscribe in our minds is that, discouraging as they are, rejections aren’t failure. Giving up is.

Since March is the Month of the Woman, I’ve been thinking about the first fictitious heroine who inspired me In the distant days of childhood – Sara in “A Little Princess.” For those who don’t recall the book or managed to avoid the syrupy film versions, Sara was a seven-year-old (my age!) deposited in a British boarding school by her father when he had to live in India. She was so wealthy she wore lavish clothes and had a suite to herself, while the other girls in the school doubled up in single rooms. (Obviously, Sara belonged to the“1%” we know too well today.)

But what made her my first heroine was the way she dealt with her sudden plunge into poverty when her father died. ( The author, Frances Hodgson Burnett, and her family, also slid downward when she was a child, a trauma that years later inspired this book.) Sara’s reversal was dramatic, for she was stripped of her finery, banished to the attic and turned into the school’s scullery maid. This would have been enough to make any other girl dependent on some fairy godmother to rescue her. But not Sara. Armed with enormous imagination, Sara had an ability to weave stories night after night like a budding Scheherazade. This converted all the girls who had previously scorned her into a worshipful audience.. Message to my young self: Learn how to make up stories and you will reap love and admiration. (It hasn’t quite worked that way!)

A few years later my literary role model was Jo, the most spirited of Alcott’s “Little Women.” I found Meg dull, Amy shallow, and Beth too goody-goody to emulate. But Jo was a WRITER ! She also had enough spunk to endure poverty with humor and to turn down the rich boy next door who proposed to her. Instead she chose to venture forth as an Independent Woman (for a few chapters anyway).

I single out these two fictitious females because they had a quality that still lures me. It wasn’t solely that they inspired me to write. It’s that each was so dauntless and determined she wouldn’t give up, no matter what fate threw at her.

Sara and Jo stayed in my mind for many years, encouraging me to create heroines of my own. The women I write may get knocked down by fate, but rise to their metaphorical feet and valiantly go forward to triumph by the last page. (Isn’t it wonderful how writers can play God — or Goddess?)

Writing may not bring the fabled “love and admiration” I dreamed of as a child, but creating strong–willed women gives me a vicarious transfusion of strength.

As Nora Ephron memorably said, “”Be the hero of your life, not the victim. “ How’s that for a March mantra?

Website: www.annehosansky.com

Books: “Widow’s Walk” – available through iUniverse.com; “Turning Toward Tomorrow” -Xlibris.com; “Ten Women of Valor” – CreateSpace.Com and Amazon.com. Also Amazon Kindle.