THE CITY IS OUR WRITING TEACHER: A MANNEQUIN CAN TEACH US ABOUT BACKSTORY
By Mary Rakow
Mannequin, NYC © Yan Pritzker pritzkerphoto.com
Sometimes a certain retail window causes us to slow down. It might be the dated style of the application of make-up. The dull red lipstick, the thin, arched brows. Maybe it’s the position of the palms against the chin. The vintage purse. If we are in the writing zone, we might see in the mannequin our main character. Or the birth of a new character in our imagination.
But we also see the objects.
The window is beautiful because the placement of the objects is interesting. We feel a story behind this mannequin, and we want to know what it is. Everything belongs. We know this intuitively. A good retail window, like all advertising, always offers a vision of a life and relationships in that life.
Like our novel, memoir, self-help book or poem, the objects and spaces between the objects in this window are composed.
And Pritzker’s gorgeous photograph is composed. Due to the reflection, we also see the structures across the street and what this mannequin/woman would see if she opened her eyes. Buildings that pre-date her. A past. Perhaps her eyes are closed, remembering. This makes the photograph all the more interesting. There are also the vehicles on the busy street between those buildings and where she is, vehicles from a later time, closer to our present. Maybe our gloved mannequin is imagining a future? As human beings we do this every waking moment, and in our sleep too. This layering of past, present and future. And we do it in our writing. The thing is, how to do it well.
Writing Exercise #1
Let this mannequin be your main character. What is her backstory? Who is she? Why is she in the shop today? Why are her eyes closed? Why are her gloves this color? Did she buy them herself or were they a gift? What about the purse? What’s inside it? And the vehicle sounds? What are her fantasies, her regrets, her to-do list for today? Don’t overthink this. Just see what you get.
Writing Exercise # 2
First the backstory: How do we bring in the pieces that are backstory? Or imaginings that are future? How do we make something that is as composed as this retail window? As composed as this photograph? That is our task.
We can write 5 sentences. We can write 500. But we can only make art if we compose a vastness. There is a vastness in this photograph. And there is a vastness in the retail window display as well. This is why we walk our cities, our neighborhoods as writers. To be stopped. To notice. To learn. Our writing teachers are everywhere.
We know this vastness which is the scope of our text is not an accumulation of details, of stuff. It’s asking a big question and ordering all the pieces so that the question is laid out in all its complexity. We never need to solve the big question we’re wrestling with. Our job is to lay out for the reader what it’s like to live with the question.
I was going to share something about backstory from my own work, particularly The Memory Room, as the title implies. I am happy with that book, and it will be 20 years in print with Counterpoint Press this April, which is such a joy.
But I changed my mind when the NYT Op-Docs, which I love, posted “Perfecting the Art of Longing” yesterday. It is an astonishingly beautiful, powerful short video, an extraordinary piece of art. Here’s the link. It teaches us a million things about life, about making art, etc. And I determined to include it instead. Here is the link and the exercise:
https://www.nytimes.com/video/opinion/100000008156922/perfecting-the-art-of-longing.
-Watch the video. Just fall into it.
-Then watch it a second time. Pause it and jot down whenever a snippet of backstory appears. Study the time stamps to see how backstory threads in. Notice how the vastness is not conveyed in a chronological order. Past, present and future all appear.
-Watch it a third time. Pause at each backstory moment. Jot down what the link is to the present. What is the pivot? The tie-in. The glue that holds the two together? Is it a word? A feeling? A contradiction? An object? A location? Keep the ways these juxtapositions work in mind as you write your own text this next month. Keep in mind vastness. Complexity. Order. Details. Composition.
And keep in mind last month’s post on minimalism, the beauty of emptiness, the art of removal. If you can find any line in this video that should be cut, tell me in the Comments! I couldn’t find one. It is so distilled. So pristine. So perfect. Find any line in this story that you feel is just stuff. Any word or line you would cut. I couldn’t find one! Maybe share in the Comments if you did?
If you need an editor I’d love to hear from you. I give a discount to SFWC writers and anyone who comes through this blog. maryrakow.com
For more discussion of the mannequin and more writing exercises related to it, please see maryrakow.com
Have a good writing month. See you next time!
Mary
© Mary Rakow 2022.Please do not reproduce the photograph or text without permission.
A theologian with graduate degrees from Harvard Divinity School and Boston College, Mary writes with deep feeling and a questioning faith. She is a beloved editor. This Is Why I Came earned outstanding reviews in The Boston Globe, The Washington Post, The Atlantic, Harvard Divinity Bulletin, Commonweal, Christian Century, O Magazine, Ploughshares. It appeared on reading lists for courses at both Princeton and Yale.
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Interesting! Thank you, Mary!