Recently, I've been switching back and forth between reading two books: The Brothers Karamazov by Dostoevsky and Midnight in the Garden of Good and Evil by John Berendt. Yes, they're completely and entirely different in tone, characters, and location, yet they both present complex and intricate layers that have inspired me to further thought. I've been told the trick to good writing is to learn to love your most flawed characters, and, in my opinion, both of these writers have achieved just that. In life, it's often the "flaws" that we hold against others, even those we love. In art, it's those same "flaws" that serve to teach us something about ourselves and the world around us. For me, it's about combining the two...it's about learning to love the "flaws" in both the characters in my art and the characters in my reality...because God knows they've all had quite a lot of patience with mine.
My reading of the above books has been slow-going...mostly because I've been trying to balance work, writing, rest, exercise, and social life...and doing a very poor job at it, I might add. But I will finish. And I will move on to the others in my ever-growing stack...and perhaps revisit some old friends as I've felt To Kill a Mockingbird calling me for some time now. It's about baby steps, I suppose. Begin with something simple...and just finish what you start. Another thing I need to finish is the treatment for this new script I've been mulling around in my head for far too long. Maybe I should go get to work on that now.
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