Saturday, March 15, 2008

Write, Erase, Rewrite

I started using my local library lately, stealing away 90 minutes three days a week to plow through writing on my next book, The Noir Album: On Life in Multicultural Paris. With two kids under the age of 3 around the crib, it’s the only way this book will get done before the year 2020. My all-time favorite scribe Toni Morrison said a few times in Conversations With Toni Morrison that it’s all about the rewrite (absolutely anything you write is merely a first draft), and she’s write… uh, right. Click here for a 1,000-word section of the new book that I decided to cut completely recently; my book changed direction a bit and I rewrote the entire section. At this point, I’m writing The Noir Album to answer a core question: can blacks in France exploit their own unique culture as a commodity to improve their socioeconomic standing here, in the way that, say, black Americans have used hiphop culture to our advantage? This excerpt is a light take on my first impressions of Paris back in 1994, but I ultimately dropped it to start from scratch.

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Comments

madeleine at 3:34 PM on 03/20/08:

I know this is a pretty lame comment, but I just had to say thank you for posting your writing schedule online…it feels like I work so much, that I can’t imagine carving out any more time, but seeing that you just set aside the time…and then leave the house helped me establish my own parameters.

MML at 5:22 PM on 03/20/08:

as corny as it sounds madeleine, that’s what i’m here for. your comment’s not lame at all… glad to be of service.

shawn taylor at 4:40 AM on 03/21/08:

mml,

sorry i’ve been out of contact, but we are on baby duty. we are past our due date and are anxiously awating our child. i love it that you keep it pushing, no matter what. i’m hoping that i can carve out time finish my novel amidst the cries and diaper changes.

shawn

MML at 11:56 AM on 03/21/08:

it ain’t easy, shawn, that’s all i’ll motherfuckin say. good luck with the baby! in france, it’s amazing (and in my opinion a little unfortunate) that doctors go for the cesarian section if the baby is even one day past the due date. both my sons were quote-unquote “late.” (if i put it in quotes, do i need the quote-unquote? or the quote-unquote “quote-unquote”? i’m so meta.)

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Saturday, March 15, 2008

Write, Erase, Rewrite

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