The Process of Writing Fiction
From Where You Dream by Olen Butler
From Where You Dream is written with the same intensity as Olen Butler teaches fiction. The result has preserved the dynamism of his lectures in a remarkably candid, clarifying, and profoundly demanding how-to.
From Where You Dream Depends on Senses
From Where You Dream compiled lectures that Butler presented to his students that exhorts students to get out of their heads and into the world of senses. He thinks of fiction writers as "Artists are not intellectuals. We are sensualists.", which he posits as the seat of emotions.
Butler's emphasis on sense memories are somewhat like Method acting. He most highly values work with deep emotional connections and rich "organic coherence" at every level. He tells his students to "identify your character's yearnings: plot "represents the dynamics of desire." His own credo is
"Art does not come from the mind. Art comes from the place where we dream."
He draws on the work ranging from Margaret Atwood's to the Old Testament as well as that of his students and class discussions. it closes with Butler's own story, "Open Arms.
From Where You Dream Dreamstorming
From Where You Dream emphases to would-be fiction writers that instead of brainstorming, they should "dreamstorming" and explains why fiction should be rooted in the sensual experience, how cinematic techniques create narrative flow, and how "yearning" must be the driving force in every story.
Incisive and provocative, Butler's tutorials are a must for not only those thinking about writing fiction but for the reader as well. In writing From Where You Dream, he re-imagines the process of writing emotional rather than intellectual, and tells writers how to achieve the dream space necessary for composing honest, inspired fiction. He proposes that fiction is the exploration of the human condition with yearning as his compass.
Butler reinterprets the traditional tools of the craft using the dynamics of desire. He offers a direct view into the mind and craft of a literary master that serves both the novice and experienced writer.
About the Author
Robert Olen Butler, winner of the Pulitizer Prize in Fiction, is the Francis Eppes Professor in English at Florida State University. He considers his classes a literary boot camp. He is the author of many books including: Intercourse: Stories, A Good Scent from a Strange Mountain: Stories, Hell, Severence Stories, Had a Good Time: Stories from American Postcards, Tabloid Dreams and My Spaceman. His stories have been included in four annual editions of The Best American Short Stories. Butler has also written screenplays for Hollywood's major studios.
Butler, Robert Olsen. From Where You Dream: The Process of Writing Fiction. New York, NY: Crown Press (Crown/Atlantic) 2006
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