What is "Doom Eager"?

Lorrie Moore, from "Better and Sicker"
"Martha Graham speaks of the Icelandic term "doom eager" to denote that ordeal of isolation, restlessness, caughtness and artistic experiences when he or she is sick with an idea. When a writer is doom eager, the writing won't be sludge on the page; it will give readers -- and the writer, of course, is the very first reader -- an experience they've never had before, or perhaps a little and at last the words for an experience they have."

Thursday, February 4, 2010

the rules of writing

I continue my theme of "the rules of writing" with this quote from W. Somerset Maugham:

There are three rules for writing the novel. Unfortunately, no one knows what they are.


Maugham's Of Human Bondage begins with a brief description of the weather and the actions of a woman servant on a day when the protagonist's mother dies. What interests me about this opening is that the reader enters the story when the protagonist is very young. The first fifteen chapters take the reader through various points in the young boy's childhood. By page 56 in the Penguin Book edition I own, Philip is thirteen and attending school, The King's School at Tercanbury.

I guess what interests me here is the question of "low" versus "high" openings. It seems these days that all I hear about openings are "grab the reader's attention" and "begin as close to the end as possible." I contend Maugham does not do this and wonder if his manuscript would have been repeatedly rejected based on this opening.

Are openings of setting description and backstory (even when worked into action and dialogue) universally dismissed these days? If I've got an agent's or publisher's attention for maybe three to five minutes, do I even dare a "low" or "quiet" opening? Is this question of the best opening just a matter of current fashion?

This "no rules" thing really bugs me.
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