(OR: MAKING DEATH AS FIRST-PERSONAL AS IT CAN POSSIBLY GET)
by John Skipp
Dear class –
This is, I hope, the last of my quickees for a while. (Last-minute JAKE revisions; you don’t even wanna know.)
But the assignment itself is really cool, and I hope that you have fun!
To whit:
Many people have a problem with writing first-person narrative: locked in one perspective, sustaining the illusion convincingly without becoming self-indulgent or precious, etcetera.
I find it an enormous pleasure, myself, in the same way that I imagine acting must be fun. You commit to this one character, and their point-of-view, to the exclusion of your own or anybody else’s. But that’s just me.
Many people also have a problem writing death scenes that go all the way, IN AN EMOTIONALLY-CONNECTED MANNER. It’s one thing to get off on the grue, quite another to explore the moment from the inside, with the understanding that you are MADE OF that grue, at that moment.
So your assignment, of course, is to do both at once.
Don’t worry about the fact that your character is writing and dying at the same time. This is a message that your spirit is able to convey. So please, don’t rely on the “CASTLE ARRRRRRGHhhhhhhh…” school of hilariousness.
The persons/things you’re trying to escape from are entirely up to you. As is the manner of your death. The important thing is that you die, and do so in somewhat intimate detail.
Remember: the things that matter to you (or your fictional self) in life are as essential a component of the experience as the actual meat you’re squirting.
And once again: PLEASE HAVE FUN! I mean, if you can’t even enjoy your own death, others will clearly have to do it for you!
I’ll check in, as always, to see what horrors you’ve wrought, and offer benign encouragement to both the living and dead.
Yer instructorly pal,
Skipp
8 Comments, Comment or Ping
Brian Hodge
>don’t rely on the “CASTLE ARRRRRRGHhhhhhhh…” school of hilariousness
But … perhaps he was dictating?
No time for the assignment, not when I have a couple of deaths already planned that still need further set-up.
But I’m reminded of a gem I read in one of those “From the Slush Pile” pieces that Writer’s Digest, I think it was, would occasionally run, compiled of brief excerpts from rejected mss that editors would send in:
“The blood abruptly ceased its crashing through my veins. All was now quiet. I was dead.”
Doesn’t that just move you to tears?
Or, in keeping with the spirit, “Without warning, the saltwater commenced its squirting from my tear ducts. The silence was shattered. Hilarity had ensued.”
Jun 5th, 2008
Martel Sardina
“So,” my daughter says to my nurse, “do you think he’s going to make it through the night?”
She thinks I can’t hear her, that the morphine has knocked me out. I can’t open my eyes anymore, but I’m still here. I don’t care what these damn doctors say. I don’t have cancer. I’m not dying.
“If I were you,” my nurse says, “I’d say whatever I have to say before you leave. If you decide to leave.”
Great. Now the waterworks are on. I can hear her crying. Though I can’t understand why. Before the doctors told her I was sick, I hadn’t seen her in over a year. She had no problem saying goodbye to me then. I wonder what she finds so hard about it now.
“Okay, thanks,” my daughter says. She sits down in the chair beside my bed.
The nurse is fiddling with things. Must be adjusting the oxygen machine again. The air doesn’t seem to be coming as fast. Then she packs up her things. Her heels click-clack against the tile floor as she walks out of my room.
My daughter puts her hand on top of mine and squeezes it gently. Her hand is sweaty and I want to pull away but for some reason my arm feels heavy, too heavy to move. I’m expecting her to say something. Perhaps to make a pathetic attempt at an apology. But the room is quiet, save for the buzzing of the blood pressure cuff that turns on every fifteen minutes. When I could still talk, I told the nurse to take the damn thing off. Same with the oxygen sensor that’s on my index finger. If I’m really dying, why would they care about keeping track of such things? If I’m really dying, shouldn’t they just let me be?
“Dad,” she says. “I told them to shut the oxygen off. I can’t watch you suffer like this anymore.”
Suffer? This isn’t suffering. I’m not in pain. If she wasn’t so stupid, maybe she’d know that this is bliss compared to the way she hurt me.
I notice that the blood pressure cuff has gone slack. And that thing on my finger, it’s not there anymore either. I can still hear the beeping that indicates my heart’s still beating. It’s getting faster now. I’m having a hard time taking in air. I can feel my chest getting tighter with each labored breath. My heart’s pumping hard.
Click-clack. The nurse is back.
“Is this normal?”
“Yes. His breathing will become more erratic as things start shutting down.”
“What about his heart rate? It seems really high.”
“The heart is trying to compensate for what the lungs can’t do.”
Things are sort of going in and out now. I know they’re still talking but it sounds garbled, like someone talking on a cell phone from inside a bathroom stall. And then it hits me…my daughter, my own flesh and blood just pulled the plug on me. I’m angry now. She has no right to make that choice, to play God. I want to scream. I try to move but nothing is working they way that it should. Goddamnit. I don’t want to die here. Not in this place. I wish she would have just left me at home. Let me die in my own goddamn bed. I’m going to tell her that. If it’s the last thing I do.
I heave for breath, then open my eyes.
“Dad?”
I can’t remember what I wanted to say.
“Dad?”
I’m just going to rest my head on this pillow now.
She grabs me, hugs me. Her tears trickle down my cheeks. They’re warm.
I wish I’d told her that I loved her.
Jun 5th, 2008
Julie Campbell
It’s short, but here I go.
I staggered, clutching the burning brand that had been thrust into my gut. All of the other hurts I had endured over the last day faded to nothing as my mind focused on the wracking pain in my gut.
I screamed.
They say your life passes before your eyes when you die. Mine didn’t. All I could see was a pair of soft brown eyes framed by long brown hair. Then again, maybe she was my life.
“Maggie,” I gasped knowing I would never see her again, feel her touch on my skin, listen to her laugh. That knowledge hurt worse than the brand ripping through my gut.
My heart clenched and I fell to my knees, not seeing the man in front of me, my murderer, only Maggie’s eyes until my world went black and the pain vanished.
Jun 5th, 2008
John Skipp
Dear Brian — Thanks for breakin’ the ice! Now GO KILL YOUR OWN DAMN PEOPLE! You big ol silly, you!
Dear Julie — Nice quickee, which nails all the main modalities. Especially like “Maybe she was my life”.
Important safety tip: even when you’re just dashin’ it down quick — and even if you’re more interested in the emotional than the physical — you can still take a sec to break up the action verbiage. (Gut plus gut plus gut equals TWO GUTS TOO MANY!)
That said: well done!
Dear Martel — That was fucking awesome, a densely layered snapshot of the end of a life. You had insight into the characters, a clear sense of death’s progression, and a sweet little turnaround/punchline.
It shows a lot of work and thought, and I loved it very much.
KEEP ‘EM COMIN’, KIDS!
Meanwhile, I’ve got my own killing and dying to do tonight. I’ll catch up in the morning.
Yer pal,
Skipp
Jun 5th, 2008
Dave Wilson
Like Brian, I’m pretty mired in too much … well…mire…to take up the assignment, but I wanted to say that it’s not just the death scene, of course. First person narrative, which I also love, as evidenced in my first and still most successful novel, “This is My Blood,” is the Holy Grail of intimacy. If you can pull it off in any truly intimate segment, it has the potential to give much greater insight. It also has the threat of utter banality…
Good subject…
Good luck with Jake!
DNW
Jun 6th, 2008
Julie Campbell
Skipp,
heh, yeah I noticed that right after I posted it, unfortunately I didn’t think I could edit my post and I honestly didn’t think about reposting it until just now. I apologize for my repetition. Thanks for the comments. I appreciate them.
Jun 6th, 2008
Julie Campbell
PS Martel:
I especially loved your last line.
Jun 6th, 2008
Martel Sardina
Thanks for the comments, Skipp. I always look forward to your posts. Glad you’re back this month.
And thanks to Julie, too
Jun 8th, 2008
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