Sunday, August 16, 2020

Pruning completion

I've continued pruning this week. This will be my last pruning post. I've finished pruning. The past six days, I pruned 91, 151, 122, 66, 88, and 45 words, working by pen/paper and computer in morning for 2-3 hours and at night by pen/paper for around an hour. Part 3 of my novel is now 1030 words shorter than in the second draft. It went from 29,957 to 28,927 words. It took eight days to go through it twice. I pruned an average of 125.375 words per day. After I go through part 4—there are some things I want to transplant there from the other parts—the third draft will be done. I think the cover is being made now by my publisher. We reconsidered the title for a few days and decided to keep Leave Society. I'm looking forward to posting unused material that isn't pruned material in future posts in this weekly series. Here is what I pruned from Tuesday-Sunday (besides prunings of one or two words, which I didn't save):

-The other movements were fast. 
-Using pigments made from azurite, limonite, soot, woad, weld, and other minerals and plants
-had also been rectangular, one-roomed, and kitchened 
-the worst-seeming place for careful contemplation 
-seemingly life-long 
-Daodejing, 3422; The Bible, 13,220
-Li said there used to be more birds everywhere, that the title of the book Silent Spring referred to the eerie silence in many places due to pesticides inadvertently killing many birds. 
-He wanted to elaborate, but sensed he would seem and feel unreasonable. 
-Kay said at a book event the previous night in a group of people she’d said she’d been rolling cigarettes with organic tobacco, and there’d been no response. She’d felt like she had a secret. Li said he felt that way when researching nature and society. 
-or be able to live without a caretaker 
-The sharing brought them closer to one another. 
-corruption whistleblowers 
-send photos of food, or 
-and so he felt safe 
-and that he wanted to be weirder, so that when he encountered compelling yet obscure information, he’d feel encouraged to explore instead of ignore or suppress 
-and triggered health problems 
-They were on the platform where he’d escalated away from and immediately back to his parents the previous day. 
-Li flapped and deepbreathed while facing the waterfall. 
-“I have papers coming out that will be read in a hundred years." 
-Li said his nonfiction book referenced thirty papers. 
-That night, drawing in his room, Li listened to his dad talk on the phone to one of his employees. After a long silence, Li’s dad started talking again, repeating a question. Li’s mom, in the kitchen, interrupted him, saying she’d thought he’d been talking to his employee. “No,” said Li’s dad, and repeated the question. Li left his room smiling and saw his mom’s annoyed face. Seeing his smile, she smiled. 
-time, space, imagination 
-It still doesn’t feel right. 
-“There wasn’t any ‘will not’ when you left?” said Li. 
-“Maybe some people said it, but you didn’t know them,” said Li. 
-who’d lived until he was eighteen 
-like picking up blood test results 
-instead of trying to use it against her 
-wearing earphones at his desk 
-because he’d wanted to be near his dad. 
-At Whole Foods, Li realized Mike had a seemingly unique facial expression in which he flattened his cheeks in a kind of metaexpression, over which he could layer smiles, smirks, frowns. 
-He says when you view it like this, it can help you calm down, and do something. 
-except birthday and Christmas gifts 
-as he’d started doing in emails lately 
-leading from roof to height-staggered roof 
-or lipstick

42 comments:

  1. Hey Tao, how much of Leave Society is based on your real life?

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    1. I think all of it is based on my life. I took around 500,000 words of notes on my life over five years that I used to help me write it.

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  2. Hi tao, unrelated but, what music are you interested in these days

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    1. I've been listening to 95+ percent classical music. While pruning, I've been listening to Chopin's berceuse and other calm classical music, like the slow movements of Beethoven violin and piano sonatas, on repeat at a low volume, and sometimes playlists of classical music.

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  3. Hi Tao,

    Can you help me and my friend (Both 23) find a third roommate to live with us in Bushwick starting next month? Having a hard time finding people and you seem well connected. Rent will be between 700-900. Loved Taipei. Thanks.

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  4. Thanks for reading Taipei. I'll let you know if I learn of anyone.

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    1. Thank you Tao much appreciated. I can be reached at daconstine@gmail.com . Looking forward very much to your next novel.

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  5. I have read this and have decided to steal a few pruned phrases to use in my real life, such as "I have papers coming out that will be read in a hundred years." and "when you view it like this, it can help you calm down, and do something." You will receive 0 credit from me whenever the chance arises for me to use these two phrases.

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    1. I'm glad you will try to use some of my pruned phrases.

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  6. Hey Tao,

    Thank you for sharing these almost-never-examimed and highly intimate parts of the writing process. It's really interesting. And kind of courageous in an original way.

    I'm curious, what are your thoughts on audiobooks? Particularly whether you'd feel enthusiastic about recording one for Leave Society yourself, in your own voice, and whether you have a preference for your readers engaging your work in one form versus another.

    As an aside, I was inspired to ask while listening to an audiobook for the first time today. It was Ryan Holiday's Conspiracy, read aloud by the author. It reminded me of you at times, both because it's a book with themes and ethical dissections I think you'd enjoy, but also in part because he sounds a little like you vocally. Not glaringly so. Just certain lilts and syllables land pretty close and feel unique to you both. Not sure what exactly to make of that, really. Might be cool to hear whether you hear the same.

    While listening to his somewhat non-traditional reading voice it did occur to me, though, that you might not be the obvious choice to narrate for a publisher. Or maybe even in your own opinion. This felt mildly unfair. While I enjoy the kind of plain and unaffected speaking style you seem to usually have, I feel safe in assuming others wouldn't be slow to call it "awkward" or "alienating" or in some other way "objectively bad" for sales-related reasons or something. All of this is just loose speculation of course. But I find your voice sincere, if nothing else, which has to be right up there with the most important qualities in a narrator. Not to mention the novel seems like it's highly autobiographical, which would make your reading all the more powerful, in my opinion.

    Anyway, wondering what thoughts you might have about these kinds of things after reading this ramble.

    Thanks again Tao for all the inspiring writing.

    Madison

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    1. Thanks for finding my voice sincere. I don't think I want to read the audiobook for Leave Society, but I'd be open to it if asked.

      I've only listened to one audiobook I think. It was Jade Sharma's novel, "Problems," and the reader's voice distracted me from the writing because it sounded theatrical. I stopped after 1/3 or so, and read the book in print. Later I watched a video of Jade Sharma on YouTube and she reads in a deadpan which I liked more.

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  7. What do you think future novels will be like?

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  8. Tao - when you were writing 'Taipei' did you feel poignantly nostalgic when you revisited your childhood in Florida? Or do you feel like it was just another time in your life and nothing special?

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    1. I don't remember feeling nostalgic, maybe because I wrote about feeling alone and depressed.

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  9. Thanks for doing this blog - do you have a set time for reading during the day or do you just do it 'whenever'? Also do you still live in New York City?

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    1. Currently I have no set time. I don't live in NYC anymore, no.

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  10. Replies
    1. I already had a blogger account and many other blogger blogs (see my blogger profile) so it seemed easy and familiar.

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  11. Hello Tao,

    Have you ever tried learning any mathematics? You have a very lucid and sincere way of communicating, and for some reason I think you would enjoy working through a proof or two.

    Have you ever read any Pentti Linkola or Ted Kaczynski? I do not know that you would find their positions agreeable, but I have seen and heard you you touch on the damage modern society does to ecosystems and human health. You seem to value life and autonomy so I think there is a kinship with these two authors even if there is not agreement.

    Thank you for blogging. I enjoy reading your blog. I think you are original in your thoughts (or as original as any of us can be), and I admire how meticulously you analyze so many aspects of your life through note taking and experimentation.

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    1. Thank you for your thoughts on my way of communicating. I haven't tried learning math since high school or read anything by those two people. I remember liking a non-negative essay on Ted Kaczynski by Joy Williams in her essay collection Ill Nature. Thanks for the recommendations.

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  12. Tao - just wanted to let you know that I taught a section of 'Taipei' in my creative writing class at NYU - it was the section in which you discuss being in school as a young person, being in 'Gifted', having that important conversation with your Mom. Just wanted to say thank you for all the writing and looking forward to the new book.

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  13. Tao, do you edit at all while writing a first draft?

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  14. Hi Tao,

    What do you think of synchronicity? Does everything happen for a reason, purposefully, in order for us to expand and grow? I sometimes feel everything Does happen for a reason specific to where I am meant to go in my life on earth, but/and like you, departed from a very nihilistic and depressed teenage-early adulthood through forays into alternate modes of consciousness(chan mediation and mushrooms), consciousness, nature, and new-ageish-spirituality which finds itself entwined with mushroom usage and youngish adults. I sometimes wonder if I am swinging on this pendulum from one extreme view to the other--that this outcome of my worldview is a product of the subconscious surveying of popular counter-culture-ish ways of living outside of hopelessness. There's SO much hopelessness seemingly...right now with all the situations we find ourselves in ecologically, economically, politically.

    Also, can you talk about how you feel like you get better at writing? Or works you have referred to, like "how to write" books you've found helpful to you?

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    1. I like synchronicities and they can feel meaningful and encouraging and helpful when I'm not depressed. When I'm not in a good mood, they feel like nothing, or even bothersome or annoying. When I'm on psychedelics or stoned and happy, they seem to happen more and/or I notice them more and they seem more interesting and notable.

      I don't think I've gotten better at writing. It takes as long or longer for me to write a sentence in one of my novels, for example, as it did 10 years ago.

      I think Rust L. Hills' book on short story writing helped me some when I read it around 10 years ago. Lorrie Moore's "How to Become a Writer" helped me.

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  15. Hi Tao I love your writing. Why did you change your really long instagram handle? I remember following a handle that looked like 239tjg02gf02dj or something lol. hope you are doing well

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    1. I had one that was something like @mghaosifhaoeifheaoife but Instagram changed it to @taolin one day without telling me. Someone had commented on my Instagram at some point before that asking if I wanted them to try to get @taolin for me because my profile used to say something like "how do I get @taolin or @tao_lin" and I said yes and I think that person must've asked Instagram.

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  16. Do you have a pub date for Leave Society?

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  17. Hi Tao, I love your writing. You're my favorite author.

    Have the cramped feelings / inflammation you felt in Trip subsided through diet / life changes? What's your routine like right now (substances included)?

    And I think I remember in an interview you said your goal in life is to be happy in any environment, and, like, find a girlfriend. Are those still your goals?

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    1. Thanks for enjoying my writing. I have less inflammation now than I've ever had maybe. I wake and go to sleep at around the same time every day now, around 6:30AM and 10PM. I've been using matcha, cannabis (ingested), and kava kava powder. I think my goals currently include being stable, exercising, working on garden, and finishing my novel's third draft.

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  18. Hi Tao. I notice from your Instagram that your new living space is more spacious, organized, light-filled, and 'traditionally' decorated than your apartment in NYC, which (based on the pictures presented in the Vice article about your apartment many years ago) was relatively cluttered, with wires, sculptures, and a generally bohemian (or 'punk') vibe predominating. If this is correct, do you feel that as you began personally changing your outlook circa 2014/2015 (as you describe in 'Trip'), the way you decorated your living space changed with it? Do you feel calmer and happier in a bigger space with greenery out the windows - and do you feel that some of this is simply about getting older and moving away from the messy, cluttered aesthetic of 'young artist in NYC'?

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  19. Hi Chris. Thanks for noticing things on my Instagram. I've lived in around 10 different places since leaving my NYC apartment in 2018, none of which were decorated by me except my current place.

    The photos you saw of my apartment in NYC were from 2012 or 2013, when I was using a lot of pharmaceutical drugs and feeling very bleak. I still liked being organized and tidy, but there were times when I didn't feel motivated to tidy or organize or clean anything. What it looked like just happened from not doing anything about it.

    I do feel calmer in a place with more space and greenery. My NYC apartment was 345 square feet with a view of a fire escape and a brick building.

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    1. Thanks for your response. By the way I thought you might like this book: 'Changes in the Land.' https://www.amazon.com/Changes-Land-Indians-Colonists-Ecology/dp/0809016346

      It's more of a history book but I thought it might connect to your interest in how societies can damage nature. There's a lot of information about how individual plant species were affected, and also about native agricultural practices.

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    2. Thank you for the recommendation, which seems interesting. I will look into it.

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  20. Hey Tao,

    Long-time fan of your work (i think i read richard yates for first time in 2012). Not sure if this is something you’ve spoken about before or are interested in speaking about, but I am interesting in hearing your thoughts about what Kanye West is doing in Wyoming. Seems like there might be some parallels between his ‘mission’ out there and many of the topics you’ve recently begun to discuss.

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    1. I haven't heard about how he's related to Wyoming, or what he's doing there, but I like some of what Kanye West said in his Forbes interview about his presidency run. He mentioned some of his priorities were to "Clean up the chemicals. In our deodorant, in our toothpaste, there are chemicals that affect our ability to be of service to God.”

      I was interested when he said, "It’s so many of our children that are being vaccinated and paralyzed. . . . So when they say the way we’re going to fix Covid is with a vaccine, I’m extremely cautious. That’s the mark of the beast." The phrase "the mark of the beast" there seems funny and interesting to me. 

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    2. Thanks for the reply! Can’t wait to read Leave Society once it’s out

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