FlashFiction.Net

Nicolle Elizabeth is a fiction writer and diy gal. she’s not entirely around, but getting around. she has been a writer for 25 of her 28 years alive so far. her blog’s here.


I’ve read an interview you gave for Fictionaut in 2010. When the interviewer asked about your creativity strategies, you replied that you are ” lucky to be insane.” Do you think on some level that all writers are a bit insane, or maybe that we become insane after we start writing?

Creativity strategies wow. You know what at the end of the interview I’ll write out a bunch of writing exercises other people have given me which seem to help sometimes as far as creativity strategies go. On insanity let’s see here. Well first, I think the artistic compulsion to create is difficult but also a gift. Think of all these other plebians who aren’t writers or artists who are just strolling through life un-understanding the depths within them. They might have it easier by living life without taking the time and energy to make art, but I don’t know that a non-artist has it any better. I think that the compulsion to create is also a form of insanity in a way because we feel this artistic tug to try to express something and that it sometimes causes us to like, stop whatever we’re doing and work on our art. Tourettes? Is having writing like having Tourettes? Is that offensive to wonder sorry. Writing causes us to rather stay in on Saturday night and make art instead of going out with our friends, or it causes us to wander mind-wise during a conversation to mentally note a sentence, we pull away from the crowd at the bar to jot two words down into a notebook next thing we know we missed the joke and can’t keep up with the conversation when we try to return to it because we were at the other end of the bar looking like a goofball writing two words down so we wouldn’t forget them in an effort to later put them into a piece of dialogue we’ve been working on for a week instead of answering the phone which you sure as shit know is waiting on the top right side of your desktop. I think that being a writer comes from different places for everyone but I also think it comes from an extreme need to feel like we are communicating something, to be heard, to say something for ourselves or for someone else. To express a moment, an image, a part of life. Some people are entertainers. I think that being any kind of artist, a writer in particular can bring a myriad of insanities, sure. I think perhaps living in the moment can be made more difficult if a person is indulging in the neuroses of constantly thinking about their artwork, as in “I could be painting that part red right now, I could be adding these three lines right now,” and your friend at dinner across the table is going, “Hello? Hello. Where is your head right now?” I’ve known many relationships that have ended from this exact problem. I think that we can become obsessed with our own work, fanatical about writing, I don’t necessarily know if that’s a bad thing but I do know that it’s a hard thing. It is hard to be a writer, any kind of artist really. A wise man once said to me, “We work toward clarity.” And I think there is the most truth to that. We try to clarify, like we try to clarify human emotion. I’m sorry if this isn’t helping at all.

Can you tell us if threadbare von barren has been published and what you like most about it?

Threadbare was published yes. Paper Hero sold out of it and I don’t know if it’s getting another print run. Which I like. My favorite part of it is that it isn’t getting another print run. Can I say that? I like that a lot of times in indie books, such as in punk records or sculptures or one painting, that something shows up and then it is yesterday’s papers. I like the idea of a project being cared about but I also like that we move on and then remember it. The book was a tough one for me. It was a 50 page novella in which I tried to remember how I felt when I was diagnosed with an illness. I had also just lost my aunt when I was diagnosed, whom I was raised by as my mother, and I tried to also remember how that felt then instead of how it feels now. To get the shorts down more minimally, I used a method I had read Aaron Sorkin had used when writing the tv show the West Wing, which was that he would write a ton and then print it out and then literally put the writing on the floor and cut it up and re-arrange the sections. I had thought, ‘well there’s an interesting craft method’ and that was how I got the pieces as small as they were. The minimalism in lack of context proved for major misunderstandings. One critic pointed out the scene when our narrator is in pain and hallucinating, so she’s sees her aunt’s ghost standing in the room. Next thing I know a review comes up and a critic thinks it’s a political commentary on something completely different. Fair enough, because I had edited out two pages of hallucinations. These are the risks we take in minimalism. I emailed the critic about it we’re friends now. Plus I feel if readers aren’t getting what you’re writing about, then you probably aren’t doing your job as a writer so it was my fault anyway. The section from the book I like the most is the one with Queen Anne, I read that one at readings sometimes if I’m feeling sad that night. I like some of the other sentences though I guess its strange to say. The entire point of the book was to write a book just saying how I sort of but not entirely felt at the time because I felt like it or something. A lot of other broke, sick, sad people wrote in or came out and told me it meant a lot to them and that meant a lot to me. If you want the pdf I can find it in gmail but it’s not cheerful, I’ll tell you that. I believe my friend Ryan Bradley referred to me as “a fucked up chick,” after reading it, for example. Art happens. Barry and I have had our bouts both publicly and privately but I will always be grateful to him for publishing a book about women’s infertility in a fiction landscape saturated with the suburban male perspective. I mean, I love the suburban male perspective, I think they’re all great writers making great work but what I mean was Threadbare was a weird project and Barry was great running it.

Tell us about your relationship with flash fiction.

The thing with flash, that really gets me, it’s the economy of the device. How much can you say in how minimally a way? It’s a linguistics love thing too, I bet. How much can you pack in and how much will the reader unpack. Flash is some mystical mysticism. I’ve been working on a novel which has some flash pieces throughout but isn’t even told in flash because I really felt that a longer piece would be the better vehicle to best serve this particular story. I still find myself going back to flash pieces anyway. Here’s something I’ve been thinking about a lot with flash: Is the writer getting the last word in the piece or giving the reader the last word? Here this may go back to your insanity question earlier. So today I spend two hours working on the novel, a moderate but not overtly long stint, and I went out to get some fresh air and besides I am an incessant chainsmoker it’s disgusting I hate it a lot. So I’m driving around thinking about the novel and listening to the radio when I see a For Sale sign on a house. (This is in Massachusetts). Immediately I start thinking about writing a flash piece about people selling a house. Simple right? What’s the architecture like? Is the house a character itself? One story tall or two and why? Can the people selling the house walk up the stairs why? Forced heat or radiators why? What do the radiators symbolize and mean to the house owners? How many people have lived in this house in total and why and what has happened while they are living there and is that the most important part of this particular story or no? How many colors has this house been painted and in what situations and why? Was the paint layered or scraped off and why and what did the colors mean and who picked them and who painted them and why? Is there a garage is it attached to the house how many cars what kind of cars where have these cars driven? What has happened in the cars? Did the car climb mount making up a mountain itself is a fun idea isn’t it? Are they having an open house, and thus are strangers coming into these people’s place to see if they want to buy it? What are the owners like anyway? Family dynamic, place in life, occupations, what is in their refrigerator why are they selling the house, what color are their carpets and why do they have washer and dryers in the basement or another room in the house, why? What are the strangers doing when they come to look in the house? Are they a nice the strangers or are they jerks are any of them like, stealing things? Are they loving the house or hating it why? Is there a realtor what is he/she like? What is their life like? What is at stake for the realtor if the house doesn’t sell and why? What kind of animal is waiting in the shadows in the garden? Etc and a million more. I have this quite deep respect for the form and I think it can do more. People email me a man I’ve never met emailed me one time he said, “You write like I think in intermittent events,” and I thought about this very seriously for a long time actually. I think that in small detail intermittent events are what make up the entire larger parts of our lives and I think that what flash does is to slow down the narrative and give those events, seconds, thoughts greater meaning. The other night, I’m in this guy’s fridge getting a glass of water, and I notice that he has purchased “Light Dressing” as opposed to regular dressing. He’s a healthy looking dude, I thought the fact that he would buy light dressing to be incredibly moving given that he had lost a parent to a heart attack years prior, like the thought that went into that was so telling you know? I obviously thought about writing a flash piece about it, I was so moved by it, so I climb up to his lofted bed and I ask him about it and he says, “Nic it’s my roommate’s.”

I’ve noticed in a few of your stories like “Two Earthquakes” and “Redux” that you write from the first person. Is a lot of your work in 1st person?

Wow I am so interested that those are the two you picked. I mean I’m always interested because I love talking about myself but still. I almost always write in 1st but it is rarely ever actually me. I’m 5’1” and 120 pounds, that I know of, I cannot cause an earthquake. Nor do I wish harm on anyone. However, hell hath no fury like an annoyed woman working in the grocery store is an important point and I was happy to attempt to feebly make it. That story by the way had like 20 drafts -the editing staff at Corium god bless em, god bless all editors. I was once almost run over by a boyfriend though he wasn’t a cannibal that I knew of at least not at the time who knows. Redux is closer to my heart because it’s a better story. Kidding. Redux was a thing. I was taking a workshop and the professor was picking on me real bad. She was singling me out for being late, for being hungover, for never shutting off my cellphone, for loving the novel White Oleander which I do. She was assigning me double the homework of all the other students true story, and my colleagues were actually getting mad about it. I’m eating lunch with my friend she goes, “I’m tired of the you show. I’m paying to go here too.” I loathe authority and was bored with the entire situation so I wrote a short story about a woman standing in her livingroom and there was this giant fucking crow that kept ramming into the window trying to get in and it was scaring the crap out of the woman in the livingroom. Obviously I was that woman and the professor was the crow. So I bring it to workshop and she looks at me, amused slightly and goes, “Good, now re-write it but every sentence can only be five words.” I was like lady gimme a break because she knew I was working on my own other projects outside of class and she was like “No, I will not give you a break.” Eventually Redux came out of that. Which made sense because I was in the middle of a torrid love affair anyway. No I do not have any dead husbands nor do I want any though.

Redux on a subject matter level also came about because I lost a friend in Afghanistan in 2005 so I started writing all these stories about widows pining after ghosts because the pain from all of it really stuck with me. I usually send the ghost ones to Rusty at Night Train and am thinking of doing an entire chapbook of a widow pining, actually because I was so sad about the entire experience.

I write in 1st because it’s the hardest for me to write in, actually. Ask me to bust out a 3rd person story and I’ll have a story for you in twenty minutes. It might not be any good, but it’d do for the purposes of a discussion. “Martin didn’t understand. Where was he?” or something. They always come out cheesy but whatever. In 1st I have absolutely no idea what is going on and it takes work. The stakes are higher for me. You ever try to build a bed without using the directions? That’s me in 1st This Oulipo writer named Anne Garetta who is only one of the 4 women ever inducted into Oulipo wrote a novel called Sphinx which supposedly is a love story about two genderless characters told from 4th person nobody which she somehow invented. It’s still only in French. She has granted me permission to try to translate some of it which I’m working on. Gotta tell ya, it is a doozy. I also think that writing in 1st provides way, way more freedom at least for me as in say what you want about me all day long, I could care less. Same thing with the I will write about me all day long, doesn’t mean any of it’s true, I have never taken a shower via elephant trunk. Steve Almond has a good lecture on what he calls “The Lyrical Register” and he uses the example something to the effect of, “If you’re loose enough at the keyboard.” This goes back to the insanity question earlier also -The difference between compulsory writing and craft writing, however, you’ve got to start somewhere and the where is at free your mind, maaaan. It’s easier in some other ways though to write in 1st and I’d be lying if I didn’t admit. In 1st you have an authoritative narrator, possibly un-reliable depending but they can flat out state intent. In 3rd it gets a little wonky you have to flush out more and make more room for that and it takes more time and who gives a shit if “Bruce is allergic to onions,” no it’s better if you say, “I am allergic to onions” -This is specifically with regard to flash, in my opinion. This isn’t as true in the novel. 3rd can work great in the novel. 3rd in flash, can get stranger that is just my opinion it doesn’t mean other people can’t write great flash in 3rd they can. However, if you want to write comedy, always go with 3rd. “Bruce is allergic to onions,” will always come out better than “I am allergic to onions” because you have to do more to “show it” in 3rd and in 1st you can just “tell it.” I think 1st is very good for “this is how it is” and 3rd is very good for “this is how it went” and tenses are a completely different issue. Don’t ask me about 2nd I loathe colloquialisms mail em back wherever they came from I can’t believe how many times I said “you” in this paragraph as it is. Onions -found in Carver’s Cathedral, and Leonard Gardner’s Fat City read both of them. Pretty sure both of them are in 3rd.

What advice would you give to those of us who are new at flash? My struggle seems to be fresh ideas, things that someone might actually be interested in reading about.

First of all. If you think that your ideas aren’t going to be interesting to other people, you have got it all wrong. First of all point two -you can’t even THINK about other people unless they are your character or unless they are people motivating/inspiring your characters, narrative etc when writing. None of this worrying about people will think bologna. You have to just write, and craft and edit and repeat the process in whatever order you feel like. You have to write for the love of it and because you’re compelled to do it and because you must think and you must work and you must ask and you must create and a million other things and how they feel for you. Worrying about whether people are interested is out, banished, not allowed, no fly zone, get over it. I am serious. I cannot be harder on you about this: End that thinking now it is entirely unacceptable. Summon whatever kind of worth and strength you have in there and hold onto it. Cool it with the insecurities they lead to majorly bad news ask every ex husband I have ever had. Forgive the authoritative voice it just seemed like you needed that. Forgive me sounding coy while you’re at it. Seriously you want to write flash you are already awesomer than many of the people on the planet you go girl. Okay how to find fresh ideas to write about: -Thinginess. How thingy is a thing? Let’s start from the middle and work our way out. Take whatever cup/waterbottle/coffemug is within reaching distance and hold it in your dominant hand. Squeeze the cup, Susan. You feel the solidness of the object? While squeezing this cup, what else happened? Did the liquid if there is any inside move? Did you think about how it wasn’t empty? Did you drop the cup accidentally? Did the muscles in your hand and arm flex? Your neck? Now we are going to apply this method to words. Plants in a room are affected by the light you’ve already written in the room. If you write the sun was pouring into a room and you also somewhere in there have that plants are in the room, you damn sure better have those plants somehow affected by the light that you’ve created. This is getting a little bit more into setting and plot and things and we’ll go back to that. Let’s get simpler but stay on objects first. Things and they thangs. Look around. What do you see? A table, shoes, what? If you are stuck, really stuck for something, look for an object and give it a new life. What was going on at that table? A romantic dinner? An angry hand slamming against the table top? Where did those shoes walk away toward? Why is this remote control to my left significant? I haven’t read any of your work so I can’t say if you stay in realism or if you jaunt out to like the magical realm. Let’s say there’s a remote. Now apply the cup method from earlier. You ever poach an egg? Think about what an egg looks like dropping into water. Kinda spreads out yet solidifies. Are two people arguing over a remote and why? What happens while they’re arguing? Or if you’re into the super realm, does this remote send signals elsewhere? Control other things? What about an amalgamation of both ie does the guy on the couch use his remote to change the channel on his tv and it mysteriously opens the garage of the next door neighbors house and next thing you know the secret strip club in the house next door is wide open for the neighbors to see and what happens next. There is always an object. When there is an object, and the cup method, there is a way. Things. Let’s switch gears and talk writing methods. Nick Flynn who teaches all over the place but said he applies this method specifically at the Houston workshop talks about a class in which every single day everybody walks in and writes for twenty minutes before saying a word to one another. Just sit down, and write something, anything. “I hate that she is telling me to write right now.” I think also another way to do this is to have a pencil and notebook by your bedside and the moment you wake from sleep don’t do anything else just write down a couple of sentences and see what happens later. However, if it really wigs you out to write on the spot then you might no want to start your day like this. However further, if you can get over the anxiety about writing on the spot then life is more fun. It just is. Loose at the keyboard.

Other methods of inspiration? Get a newspaper. Poet/Professor Peter Shippy taught me this: Look for headlines, stories, anything. Here I just looked at cnn.com it was free one of the lines said, “Leonid meteor shower to peak.” Write about a meteor shower. Who is watching it where and how are they watching it and why. Are they wishing on the meteors? Are you watching it alone? What are you thinking while watching it.

With me it’s usually a sentence. A sentence will just show up and then I’ll roll around with it for a while and then begin to write something. It’s more about the words for me and then everything else builds later. If it’s like this for you also then I am sorry because oh man is it hard in my head.

Make sure you have a notebook around all the time to always write down everything. It doesn’t matter if you have like 50 pages of words like asparagus soup and wookie. At some point, those words made sense or struck a chord with you which is why you wrote them down and memory is a powerful thing and even if you can’t remember why you wrote them down, they’re still concepts and images to pull from in a pinch.

Then there are the trying to make a point stories. These rarely come out right in my opinion.

The evesdropping method is good. Sit in a coffeeshop “overhear” conversations around you for an hour or so, you’ll come up with something. Totally creepy but it’s fine. Fresh ideas are everywhere, you just have to be noticing them. Notice everything all the time. Become an incredibly good observer, get distracted. Advice method-wise or emotionally? Writing takes an extreme amount of selfishness. While the act itself may be giving, which I think it can be, the ability to steal away time for yourself to commit to being a writer can be excruciating. Do it anyway. If your loved ones can’t hang with that they’ll tell you and then you tell them, “Not now, I am writing for my life.”

Here are some writing exercises which are good, like going to the gym. In my case, like purchasing the gym membership and not actually going, but still they’re a workout:

• Write every sentence with only five words each. For like an entire story.
• Write every sentence with only three words each. For an entire story.
• Write a short story then take every other word out, thus giving you two separate short stories, see what they say then re-write and re-write.
• Write a story then flip the sentences, use the last sentence as the first and so on.
• Write a three paragraph story, take one sentence from each paragraph, use them to write a new story.
• Write a story without editing any of it or stopping to read and see what it looks like.
• Write a story while eliminating all punctuation.
• Write a story while listening to music that makes you really happy.
• Write a story while in bed see if it’s different than if you were writing at a desk.
• Mary Robison writes stories via sticky pad notes.
• Andrew WK writes stories via notecards. A few years ago he walked around New York handing out the notecards to strangers. Every single one of them said the same words which were: “Don’t be a wimp.”
• Realize that if you want to be a writer, then you probably already are one, the compulsion to try is a very strong thing and you should follow it and see where it takes you.
• Seriously don’t be a wimp this is a very serious craft but it’s also fun and as Mary J. Blige says, “Get out of your own way.”
• Don’t take moments in life lightly there is a significance to things, and writers are here in part to give things which would be overlooked significance. Someone says, “I don’t know how to get there,” and you know what that means something.
• I sometimes take long walks before writing, though I will be writing what I am going to type out while walking, I think that’s called talking to myself, true story.

About the Author

Susan Buchler has been an English faculty member at Montgomery County Community College for many years. She is currently an MFA in Creative Writing (Fiction) candidate at Rosemont College. She lives in Harleysville, Pa, with her husband and two children.

For further reading, check out FlashFiction.Net’s suggested readings of flash fiction and prose poetry collections, anthologies, and craft books, by clicking here.

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