Amra Pajalic

Still feeling under the weather. Have a cough that just won’t quit and a sore throat. Poor me.

Last weekend was my birthday. I am now 33 years old. It’s a funny thing turning older, while I’m not enthused with the number when I look at what I’ve achieved in the year I feel pretty happy with myself. Best of all I received a birthday present from the universe. Last year I was invited to submit a short story or the first chapter of The Good Daughter to an anthology that Hilary McPhee was putting together. I submitted the first chapter titled The Exiles Return.

Last Friday I got my advance copy of the anthology and it was amazing to see who was published in it. It reads like a who’s who of the Australian literary scene: Cate Kennedy, Tom Cho, Nam Le, Alex Miller, Gerald Murnane, Carmel Bird, Sophie Cunningham, Drusilla Modjeska etc. I’m slowly reading the collection and enjoying the stories, but I have to say that the cover is so beautifully striking. Have a look here. It will be in bookstores July 2010.

Feel like I’ve been out of touch with the world at large. I’m at that stage of the novel where it’s sucked me into it’s vortex and even when I’m not writing, I’m thinking about it. A plot twist has developed that is making me feel slightly uncomfortable, anxious and tentative. I feel mean in doing this to my characters, but this is also how I know it’s a great idea. I think you’re supposed to feel slightly uncomfortable and out of your comfort zone to write. I had this same moment with The Good Daughter and the plot twist that developed is one that was the framework of the whole novel.

My goal has been to write 5,000 words a week and I’ve been meeting that goal, apart from when I was sick. I’ve realised that when writing you go through ups and downs, moments where you’re enthused about your novel, and other times when you’re completely uninspired, but if you write regularly, and this means writing whatever comes to mind whether it’s a character sketch, description or scene, the story will come to life.

I was having a conversation with another writer about approaches to writing. She was a perfectionist where she writes slowly, but each sentence has to be perfect. I’m a long writer, lots of words on the page as I find the story and voice, then the laborious process of revising. What type of a writer are you?

Been wanting to do a blog post all week, but have been sidelined by an ear and throat infection and today is the first day I feel slightly human, if you don’t count my sandpaper nose.

I’ve been thinking lately about ideas. How we sometimes guard them, fearing that someone will steal them, how if we see an idea similar to ours we feel disheartened, and how sharing your ideas can sometimes lead to the most amazing experiences.

I think we’ve all been guilty of guarding our ideas, especially when we’re beginner writers. I was recently talking to a newbie writer who was just going through the rigmarole of submitting his short stories for the first time. His misgivings in submitting were equally divided between fear of rejection and fear someone would steal his idea.

The fact is we are all unique human beings and it is not a concept that makes short story or novel work, it’s the execution. You can give the same idea to ten people and each of them will produce a piece of work that is unique.

The first time I had this realisation was during a drama class in Year 11. The teacher gave us a group assignment to show a person in distress without dialogue. My idea was to have a student looking distressed while we used lights to flicker on and off. I was so scared that someone else had the same idea that I heedlessly volunteered us to go first.

When we finished I sat back and watched the other performances, full of superiority that if anyone else had the same idea they wouldn’t be able to use it. As each group performed I was gobsmacked to see every single group had adapted the assignment in a different way. Each performance was distinct and there was no overlaps.

Sometimes we get disheartened if we see a book or short story using the same idea that we had. We feel that all our work has been in vain. I had this experience while writing my debut novel The Good Daughter. I was writing a story I had a passion for, while also being aware that I had a unique angle. There weren’t many novels featuring Muslim characters and I knew this would make me stand out in the crowd.

While reading the newspaper I was dismayed to find a review for the novel Does my Head Look Big in This? By Randa Abdel-Fattah, also featuring a protagonist of Muslim background. While our stories are completely different my initial reaction was one of consternation. I was no longer unique and a ground-breaker, instead I was a copy-cat.

When it came time to submit I used her novel as a jumping point and one of my first lines was comparing it to Does My Head Look Big In this? Her novel and it’s subsequent success worked for me. Publishers had a context in which to understand my novel and the route to publication was made much smoother.

Sometimes it’s not the end of the world if there is another book out there that has similarities to your book. At the end of the day, there are no new ideas, just new interpretations of them. Don’t look at someone else’s success as taking something away from you, instead look for a way to make it work for you.

Sometimes we guard our ideas and we miss out on opportunities that will help develop them further. I recently completed a Brimbank Leadership Course for Muslim Women. During the course I was struck by how the mainstream understanding about Muslim women is mediated through the sensationalist debates in the media about the Burka and bears no reality to the actual lives of real Muslim women.

I kept thinking that if only people could see what 13 Muslim women actually look like, dress like, talk like, it would completely change their perception and they would not so easily be hoodwinked by journalists and politicians exploiting people’s fears.

While we were undertaking our discussions during the course the women would share their stories and I would keep thinking, I want to write that. One night during a 3 am brainwave I wrote an email to the group proposing a series of profiles about the women. I received a warm reception and our tutor Larry Marhsall encouraged Demet and I to develop the idea further.

While I knew I was on a good wicket, I was undecided about putting in the time and energy about this and not having a firm undertaking that would be able to produce the actual end product. During the graduation ceremony I talked about future projects I wanted to undertake in the community, including profiling the women.

Dr Helen Szoke ,Commissioner, Victorian Equal Opportunity and Human Rights Commission, was in the audience and approached us afterward. She wanted to provide funding for the profiles to be published. And just like that the idea became a reality. We’re now moving forward with the interviews and will begin producing the profiles in the next few months.

Sometimes ideas are like little bursts of energy that can take a life of their own. If you’re so busy guarding them, hiding them, protecting them, they never have the opportunity to grow and develop into fully fledged projects that live and breathe.

So next time you have an idea and you’re too scared to talk about it because of fear, stop and think. Maybe the opportunity to discuss your idea will not be the negative experience you think. Perhaps it will be an opportunity for you to make it all sparkly and shiny.