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why. You stare at the first page, chewing on the end of your pen
or tapping the side of your keyboard. An easy thought settles
into your mind: There's a better opening for this story. Some-
where. You should revise. But you can't think of how to write the
scene differently. If you could have thought of a better opening,
you'd have written it that way in the first place. Besides, you
shrink from the thought of revision. How do you know you'll
end up with something better this time?
You don't, of course. But there are ways to make revision
feel less like anxiety-producing indecisiveness and more like an
52
Help for Beginnings: Early Revision 53
interesting experiment. Out of this experiment can come a much
stronger opening.
Set aside an hour or two. During that time, write several
short openings to the same story, writing very rapidly, keeping
each to between three and five paragraphs. Don't try to con-
sciously judge these openings. Instead, keep producing varia-
tions by deliberately altering either narrative mode or point of
entrance into the story (more on this to come). Once you've done
this a few times, you'll become quite adept at producing these
by simply moving methodically through the possibilities. And,
inevitably, one of the variations will click in your mind, and you'll
feel that sense of Tightness and eagerness "Yes, this is it!" that
is one of the major pleasures of writing fiction.
VARYING NARRATIVE MODE:
CINDERELLA REDUX
All fiction is created out of five different ways of presenting infor-
mation to the reader, called narrative modes: dialogue, descrip-
tion, action, thoughts and exposition. Some writers rely more
extensively on one mode than on others. Hemingway makes
heavy use of dialogue, while romance writers often include lots
of description of characters' appearance, clothes and homes. A
complete story will use all five modes, but very often the opening
scene is characterized by the predominance of one mode (you
have to start somewhere).
For example, Tom Wolfe's best-selling novel Bonfire of the
Vanities opens with dialogue:
"And then say what? Say, 'Forget you're hungry, forget
you got shot ina back by some racist cop Chuck was here?
Chuck come up to Harlem ' "
"No, I'll tell you what "
" 'Chuck come up to Harlem and ' "
"I'll tell you what "
"Say, 'Chuck come up to Harlem and gonna take care
a business for the black community'?"
That does it.
54 BEGINNINGS, MIDDLES AND ENDS
This dialogue, it's important to note, is about race and class rela-
tions in New York City. It's also pretty confusing. Both these
points are important because the dialogue thus sets the stage for
the novel as a whole, which portrays big-time confusion among
social classes in a city that no longer functions the way it's sup-
posed to.
Other stories start with description of a setting, person or
object that will have thematic significance. Or with a character
performing some action that both launches the plot and offers
insight into her as a person. Or with thoughts presented in the
point-of-view character's voice. Or with exposition (this is the
trickiest), in which facts are told to the reader in summary form
rather than dramatized.
Once you understand the five narrative modes, you can eas-
ily write five miniopenings, letting the focus of the narrative
mode spark ideas and thoughts that might not have occurred
to you otherwise. As always, it's easiest to examine this process
through example. We need to use a story everyone already
knows, so let's choose "Cinderella." You are retelling "Cinder-
ella," and you can't come up with an interesting opening. The
traditional beginning uses exposition, summarizing events in a
brief lecture:
Once upon a time there was a man with a beautiful
daughter and a beloved wife. His wife died, and after a year
of grief the man married again. His new wife was beautiful
but selfish and vain. She and her two daughters, who were
just like her, made life very hard for the motherless girl.
They made her do all the washing and cleaning and cook-
ing. After the man unexpectedly died, things became even
worse for the poor child. Her stepmother made her move
out of her pretty bedroom and sleep in the cinders on the
hearth. From this she became known as "Cinderella."
You don't want to start your version this way. It's already been
done, and besides, you don't find it very exciting. You rewrite the
opening, focusing on dialogue:
"Cinderella! Have you finished the laundry yet?"
Help for Beginnings: Early Revision 55
"N-no, ma'am, I was scrubbing the hearth. . . ."
Her stepmother glared at her. "That should have been
done hours ago! You're a lazy, undisciplined girl!"
"Please, ma'am, the hearth was so filthy after Cook
roasted that whole boar "
"Silence! I will not be contradicted in my own house!"
Once it was my house, Cinderella thought but she didn't
dare say that out loud.
Better? More interesting? That depends partly, of course, on
your taste. Let's say you're still not pleased with it. You try a
different version and a different protagonist, who just popped
into your head as you started your rapid writing this time rely-
ing on action:
Cindy held the iron flat on the front panel of her step-
sister's T-shirt. Two seconds, four, six, eight. The cloth be-
gan to smoke around the edges of the iron. Ten, twelve,
fourteen. Cindy lifted the iron. A triangular scorch mark
seared the exact center of Axel Rose's face. She picked up
the T-shirt and held it critically to the light. The scorch went
clear through the fabric. Cindy smiled. Forbid her to go to
the rock concert, would they?
Better? That's still not the story you want to write? Try starting
with description:
The three clones had to look alike: They shared identi-
cal genetic blueprints. But the minds that Central had
transferred into the cloned bodies had belonged to three
different women. There stood Anastasia in black jeans,
silver-plated vest open to her navel, and mirrorshades. Next
to her Drusilla looked almost bulky in her plain bolo-cloth
work clothes and boots, the boots caked with what Danforth
suspected was cow manure. And Cindy! Were ruffles back
in style on Earth? Cindy wore real pink silk gods, the
cost at neck, sleeves, waist, hem. Her necklace and ear-
rings were bloodstones, vivid red, the same shade as her ear
56 BEGINNINGS, MIDDLES AND ENDS
paint. Danforth thought she looked like a massacre in a
lingerie shop.
Maybe science fiction isn't your thing (although at least four dif-
ferent science-fiction writers have updated "Cinderella" for the
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