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I have figured out major changes I have to make in the second half of the not-Poland novel. And by major I mean "this close to total re-writing."
I've written a bunch of relationships as things that are taken away, one after the other, so that Yanek has nothing much at the decision point at the end. But that's not really the story I want to be telling, nor the one that I ought to be telling. For one thing, it's a lie: he has everything at that point, and he'd be much more of an idiot than I believe him to be if he didn't know it. For another thing, what he's wanted since the first page when he is seven years old is to be a man (in his construction) of strength and consequence and some kind of respectability. Which includes not being a thing that fate acts on, but making choices and doing things.
So I have to go back to all those relationships and not take them away, but put them into a place where he can grasp them again, and he has to choose among them, and therefore choose what kind of man to be (since each of these relationships is in a different literal geographical place and involve different roles and different ways of living).
I do believe this is not coincidental with my realizing that I really want to stop trying to fit in to all these strange workplaces and semi-retire (that is, go ahead and work as a substitute) and just take my last opportunity to really, really, write.
I've written a bunch of relationships as things that are taken away, one after the other, so that Yanek has nothing much at the decision point at the end. But that's not really the story I want to be telling, nor the one that I ought to be telling. For one thing, it's a lie: he has everything at that point, and he'd be much more of an idiot than I believe him to be if he didn't know it. For another thing, what he's wanted since the first page when he is seven years old is to be a man (in his construction) of strength and consequence and some kind of respectability. Which includes not being a thing that fate acts on, but making choices and doing things.
So I have to go back to all those relationships and not take them away, but put them into a place where he can grasp them again, and he has to choose among them, and therefore choose what kind of man to be (since each of these relationships is in a different literal geographical place and involve different roles and different ways of living).
I do believe this is not coincidental with my realizing that I really want to stop trying to fit in to all these strange workplaces and semi-retire (that is, go ahead and work as a substitute) and just take my last opportunity to really, really, write.
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