Beloved writer Dr. Seuss died a few days ago, and I thought I'd take some space here to pay tribute. He was certainly one of the best-selling (if not the best-selling writer for children) of the 21st century. Most Americans can recall either having read Dr. Seuss books as a child, or reading his books to children or grandchildren. I suppose the most well-known of his books was The Cat in the Hat.
No doubt Dr. Seuss has been parodied to death, too. His verse lends itself to all manner of humor, which is another tribute to greatness.
Some years back I wrote my own modern-day version of his book Hop On Pop, and I thought I'd offer it again here. Anyway, just my way of saying "Dr. Seuss, you shall be missed!"
Hop on Pop
The bills keep coming
They won't stop
Everybody
Hop on Pop
The wife likes spending
Loves to shop
But she never
Hops on Pop
The college calls
They want a drop
I write a check
They Hop on Pop
The teenage son
Thinks he's Aesop
Believes he's wiser
Than his Pop
The daugher's wedding
The cake top
And all expenses
Hop on Pop
Daddy feels
Like a bellhop
Taking orders
But he's Pop
Sometimes he cooks
The evening slop
But each complaint
Still Hops on Pop
Daddy cleans
He likes to mop
But still there's dirt
That Hops on Pop
The politicians
And their crop
Have a solution:
Hop on Pop!
Sometimes Pop dreams
He'd like to swap
His life insurance
Cash for Pop
But life keeps coming
It won't stop
Everybody!
Hop on Pop!
For the most part, the Oscars are a showcase of "outfront" personalities--the pretty faces and famous names in front of the camera. But secretly I enjoy the Oscars for the small, but essential awards and accolades given to the writers. After all, none of the acting can happen without the words. And words come from writers . . . those men and women who slave away in anonymity (for the most part) and who produce all of the screenplays and treatments. Everything celebrated at the Oscars first began on the page.
If one listens closely enough, some of the actors who receive their awards will thank their writers, and sometimes note them by name (usually the person no one has heard of). But awards are also given to best original screenplay and best screenplay adaptation (meaning it is a screenplay written from another work, or based on a work such as a novel or other original concept).
So, I'll be listening for the writers. These are also going to be the most shabbily-dressed people in the crowd. The writers are the ones who come forward to receive their awards dressed in pajamas and bath robes, their usual writing attire.
And the movie that will win best screenplay? No sure. But some writer our there will be smiling.
My wife claims she still has all of the love letters I have written to her . . . which must be an imponderable pile by now, seeing as how I have written hundreds, and an even greater number of love poems. But I've never seen this stash, she must be hiding the whole shebang in four sock drawers. And as far as I know, she doesn't use any of my letters as stuffing in undergarments. Most likely, I'll find this trove at a most unlikely post, like in the trunk of the car next to the spare tire, or perhaps under the lawn mower cushion. All of my letters will just come flooding out, very likely embarrassing me in front of my in-laws, where I'll have to explain to my father-in-law what I meant when I wrote, "I wanna get jiggy wid' it" or "meet me under the back deck at midnight and we'll hunt for night crawlers."
Love letters are, if anything, an embarrassment to real literature. And yet, here they are, spewing forth from my pen in great profusion. I write 'em on napkins, on the backs of cardboard boxes; I write 'em on used envelopes and, when the kids are not at home, scrawl a few lines on the kitchen counter in ketchup.
Not that these love letters have had any impact, of course. At least, I've seen no negligible traces of influence through nearly thirty years of marriage. But I still write 'em.
Last night, I wrote two incredible love poems while in a state of near exhaustion. In fact, I know I'll find a home for these poems in some journal or magazine that is managed by an equally inept male editor who only dreams of romance, but can only find love through the newspaper classifieds.
Most of my love poetry ends up this way . . . first appearing in university journals or, at times, in the pages of slicker magazines. It's months after I have written them, but the publication, I hope, will somehow prove that I am a Romeo to be reckoned with, a guy who can write love in pentameters, or sonnet forms, or even in free-flowing verse that has no boundaries. Sometimes, I write well enough to get paid. But now that I have hundreds of these things alongside my by-line, they are just another by-product of my imagination, romantic ponderings that have no basis in reality.
One of these days I'll find those love letters in the most unlikely place. I won't remember writing any of them, but I'll know I did. I would recognize my handwriting anywhere.
After all, we don't have our milk delivered to the door anymore.
I love signing contracts (when I sign them). Yesterday, when I returned from a pastor's conference, I signed four. Four in one day. Might be my new record.
I signed up with a New York publisher for a new book. I signed two other contracts granting permission to have nearly a dozen of my essays published in two magazines. And I signed another contract (electronic pen online . . . with that tiny little hand) granting permission for a journal to publish a poem.
I'd love to say that I love the smell of fresh ink in the morning, but there's very little ink used in contracts anymore. Contracts now days are essentially long rambling documents, written in legal jargon (which I have finally learned to interpret), and the writer signs the whole shebang at the end in illegible script.
In my office at home I have a filing cabinet, one drawer nearly filled to the brim with writing contracts. These things mound up as the years go by. I rarely have need to pull them out . . . but sometimes questions arise around issues of second rights, or foreign rights, or even such mundane matters as the number of author copies to be shipped at the time of publication. Sometimes I pull out an old contract to check royalty percentages or the scale of the percentage built around sales figures.
Often, when writers talk about these matters, folks believe that we are discussing enormous sums of money. In actuality, most contracts I sign are for $0 net, and even with books the sums discussed are mere pennies. Still, contracts look impressive . . . especially when they are piled high in a filing cabinet drawer and my wife sees them and the stack causes her to become romantic and she yells at me for not having dinner ready. Fifteen page contracts can have this effect upon women, and I always make sure my wife is sitting next to me on the couch when I sign them. It's my way of telling her that I have value, that I am worthy of her ten minutes of attention each week.
Of course, she always wants to know, "How much are you gettin' to write this?"
My answer is usually, "Nothing. It's just the honor of being married to a guy who can write a decent love poem."
This is where she walks away and sticks her nose in the freezer, searching for a creme sickle.
I just sign the lines.
My first delivery of the year was a sizable box that included a treasury of books . . . all to be read and reviewed. I'm now underway, pages deep into the endeavor, already formulating my synopses of these titles.
Writing book reviews is a most different kind of writing. It is at once powerful and humbling. There is the sense of urgency combined with the tedious plodding through pages, an unwillingness to take chances with another writer's handiwork while at the same time an eagerness to comment on it. Being fair and honest, while also insightful, is a difficult business.
But I enjoy writing book reviews and, as the publishers and authors look to me for my insights (as I look to other reviewers for theirs) there is a sense of camaraderie, of being a part of a great industry of words, with my reviews serving as part of the bridge between the writer and the eagerly-awaiting public. (Are they eagerly awaiting?)
I don't write reviews for all the books I read. I have made it a point not to write negative book reviews. If I can't tolerate a book, I won't pan it. I'll simply ignore it.
Under further review, this seems like sane practice to me. I don't have to engage in all conversations. Sometimes, just reading a book is enough.
Somewhere in the dim, dank recesses of our basement storage are boxes filled with assorted VHS and DVDs of childhood years. Among them is a set of SpongeBob Squarepants episodes.
I liked SpongeBob. He loved hamburgers and . . . well, he lived in a pineapple under the sea. He also lived vicariously through an assortment of characters who served as friends and foils. As I recall, one friend was Squidward--a fellow who played the clarinet (and that no so well), and another was a squirrel named Sandy (who wore a glass dome on her head so she could live under the sea). Watching that show, and other animated features, always impressed me as a writer's paradise. With animation, a writer can do most anything.
Many years ago, in college, I had a course in Shakespeare, and the professor pointed out that there are, in actuality, few plots. Shakespeare was a master at using similar plot lines over and over again. Certain of these involved a flawed hero (Hamlet), the star-crossed lovers (Romeo & Juliet), or plots that were either tragic (the hero's flaw ends badly) or triumphant (the hero's flaws are overcome and there is redemption at the end).
Writing novels (and short stories) basically involves one of these (or a few other) plot lines. The writer may not always be aware of using a plot, but nearly all novels are formulaic to some degree, with mysteries, thrillers and romances being the most predictable. Still, a great genre novel never misses, and the best writers have a knack for kicking some new or unexpected element into an old formula.
And for those who want to write comedy, I don't think you can go wrong with studying SpongeBob episodes. Take out the starfish and the blowfish and the Crabby Patties and you have some decent comedy here. With a few holes in it.
Of all the tasks related to producing a book, working on the book's cover is exhilarating, especially when the publisher desires input from the writer. In recent months I've been involved in quite a number of these forays.
And now, in this age of both print and digital, it is not uncommon for a publisher to produce several covers for the same book, the idea being that different colors, schemes and even type face can somehow appeal to various demographics of readers.
In addition, once a book moves into the cover stage, there is a growing sense of finality, as if the thing is actually going to be born. The cover seems very much like the creation of Frankenstein's monster, and an author always wonders if people will be amazed by this new thing or frightened of it. The cover always signals the end of the writing, too . . . and if a writer is still working on the book, the publisher is now standing on the top deck, waving the glow sticks, and the writer had best be landing. If he's not completed the manuscript by now there is a good possibility that he is going to have to ditch in the ocean.
I have always been one of those who finish a manuscript much earlier than expected. In fact, most publishers have to tell me to hold onto the manuscript for a few months, they just aren't ready to accommodate me. And so, while I'm sitting on those manuscripts awaiting their adopted covers, I'm working on others, and the crude just keeps on flowing. My biggest problem is having to go back and work on a manuscript I finished months before, reconnecting with my old friends while I'm making new ones, and trying to recall exactly why I placed a footnote on the bottom of page twenty-two, for example, or trying to answer a question like: "Would you like to change the type face on page ninety-seven?"
Good Lord, I just don't remember . . . what's on page ninety-seven?
But book covers are different. I rather enjoy discussions about photography, light saturation, type faces, and size (yes, size matters!). I feel in these discussions the finality of the book, the sense of urgency required to finally "kill another one" so that I can begin creating the next. Publishers, I'm sure, have this same elation, but from the marketing end of the stick. They complete their lineup when a writer gives the final nod.
Then, we go to print (or to the net). But that, my friends, is another story entirely.
