Comments on: “The First Five Pages”

By: shudip

shudip — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 08:22:37 +0000

Being a professional writer and a mainstream Indian journalist myself, I find Mr Pressfield’s observations not only timely but very relevant. Experienced wordsmiths can trip badly without knowing how and why they went wrong. I think ‘The Frist Five Pages’ will be a boon to both the budding and experienced writers. It will help them negotiate the way to literary success, beset with pitfalls and treacherous minefields. Being a die hard fan of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, perhaps the most masterly military commander in history, I happily stumbled on ‘Killing Rommel’ recently, which I intend to read as soon as I can lay my hands on a copy.

By: Bob Havey

Bob Havey — Tue, 24 Nov 2009 17:38:27 +0000

Bought ‘T’he First Five Pages’ last night.
Great stuff. Thanks for the tip.

By: Jenny

Jenny — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 22:25:10 +0000

A friend from Brown just corrected me. “Home in” is appropriate. Who the hell says “home in”? Seriously.

By: Jenny

Jenny — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 20:36:25 +0000

I bought this book during my lunch break, and while I am certain it will be very useful, as a humor writer, I cannot help but point out that there is a typo on page four. Am I supposed to continue reading? Or take it back to the store.

“Home” instead of “Hone”.. in case the author frequents the comment section of reviews on his book.

By: Rob

Rob — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 19:40:09 +0000

Judging two books against each other, based on “quality,” is impossible. The problem is reader slant.

My wife reads romance novels, which I consider lame hackwork. I read technothrillers, which my wife finds boring and unemotional. We both agree that Literature is worthless crap. We have severe genre fiction slants.

Same with movies. Same with video games. I’m plaing a PS3 game called Dragon Age, which I consider the greatest work of video game writing of all time. On Metacritic is averages an 87 rating. I’ve played most PS3 games that have scored between 80 and 100. But I like this 87 game better than most of the 90+ games. So even the concensus of a collection of professional critics, judging a work based on “quality,” is mostly meaningless. “Quality” doesn’t affect audience enjoyment.

And “quality” doesn’t affect sales. Twilight. Harry Potter. The Star Wars prequeals. What could we compare them to? The Lord Of The Rings? My wife’s friend Jen, a rabid Literature fan, can’t bring herself to finish the LOTR books because she finds them hollow boring generic crap. And she loves the HP series. I have an uncle who refues to watch any movies with exposed nipples. That’s his slant.

Who of us is qualified to judge? Should we create a Secret Committee Of Pretencious Fucks to sit in judgement of all artistic works, to hand out gold stars only to The Truly Worthy? Or would it be easier to just give the job to Oprah? I don’t know. The ecosystem is so complex. Publishers publish, agents represent, authors write, readers read, life is short, time is limited, and people make all their decisions based on pleasure.

Personally, Steven Pressfield’s “The Virtues Of War” is my favorite work of art of all time. I would put it against any book, movie, game, painting, song, or creative sexual position. To me, it’s pure pleasure.

By: johnmark7

johnmark7 — Thu, 19 Nov 2009 11:13:10 +0000

Here’s a deal for ya, Steve. I’ll put up the first five pages of one of my books against the first five pages of any of your books (go ahead and put them online if others want to judge), and bet you $50 or $100 that mine is better. And you get to be the judge.

You get to judge your own work against mine. That’s how great my confidence is that I am a vastly superior artist than you. I am so good, so fine, that even as a biased judge, you can’t help but acknowledge the truth to your own detriment, you being a reasonably honest and conscientious person and such.

How about it? game on?

By: johnmark7

johnmark7 — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:36:56 +0000

You can write the best darn book in the world and still will be rejected. Prove to an agent that you will make him or her money, then you’ll get published no matter how crappy you write’ or spend $100 K on the Iowa Writer’s Conference or some other academic program, suck up to the author/teachers and they will pave the way for your literary novel that no one reads to get published and awarded.

Cormac McCarthy sells 5000 copies of his novels until they get made into a film. Brad Thor sells hundreds of thousands. Both are crap writers but on opposite ends of the spectrum.

By: Morgan Atwood

Morgan Atwood — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 19:32:52 +0000

Haven’t read “The First Five Pages”, though I’ll endeavor to at least skim it next time I’m in a bookstore as it sounds like it may be quite valuable.
While not having read this book, I’ve seen a lot of negative reactions to advice from agents/editors before. I find the discredit given to lit. agents and editors by writers to be amusing, if not a little sad. While they may not know “feces from shoe polish”, they know what they know which is what sells.
Right now, no matter how much a lot of literary writers or would-be literary writers screech about it, fiction isn’t selling much at all. Literary fiction even less. A lot of good work may never get published, because its simply not saleable. If you’re a writer who wants to sell, knowing how an agent or editor is going to approach your work is invaluable. You don’t like it – You just have to do it.

Even breaking out of conventional publishing, I see value for this perspective. In the modern age where more and more fiction is being published online and in unique, shorter, formats suited for the internet wired-brain, and writers are depending more and more on the fans directly (vice through a publisher) for support and income, bringing this level of professionalism to the work isn’t going to hurt anything.
There is a problem of not being taken seriously as a writer who is published online, or who publishes emerging formats such as “twitter fiction”, and is making direct pleas to the fans for support. If you’re that sort of a writer, you can afford less to throw away professionalism in your work and attitudes, than many who are being conventionally published or seeking it.

Not saying to sacrifice your art to meet some artificial standards – Learn how to sell your art through the standards is more like it. Plenty of writers have done this – I’ll draw on my favorite author Cormac McCarthy. He uses punctuation sparingly, to include never using quotation marks (even in dialogue rich work). When he does use it though, he uses it precisely. His writing is strong, very powerful and, while eccentric, professional in structure and usage. There are others as well.
I’d say the value of this type of advice is not so much about conforming to the system, if you’re a literary writer, as learning the system so you can work despite it.

By: Jeff

Jeff — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 18:55:23 +0000

I love the premise of this book as it reminds me of Walker Percy’s forward to A Confederacy of Dunces. John Kennedy Toole killed himself before ever getting his manuscript published and it sat in his closet for close to 10 years or so until his mother started tirelessly shopping it around. Finally, John’s mother brought it to Walker Percy when he was teaching at Tulane or LSU or some such university. And according to Percy, his highest wish was to be able to dismiss both the crazy woman and her son’s manuscript by finding it to be crap within the first few pages. And then the worst thing in the world happened: the manuscript was better than good; it was great!

Few of us have a crazy mother who can shop our script around for years on end until she finds a literary giant capable of seeing its merit. Even fewer can create characters as brilliant as Ignatius J. Reilly. But even if we are so lucky to have both factors in our corner, we still have to keep from being rejected within the first 5 pages.

Thanks for the head’s-up on this book, Steve. Just went on my Amazon wish list for the holidays.

- Jeff

By: JHHK

JHHK — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 18:01:20 +0000

I own at least a hundred books on craft. These are the best three…

(1) Story – by Robert McKee
(2) The War Of Art – Steven Pressfield
(3) Techniques Of The Selling Writer – Dwight V. Swain

None of the craft books on the market even come close these three.
I own Lukeman’s book too. But it wouldn’t even make my top 20.