Of Effort and Grace

Annamaria on Monday

I made a big mistake, and I am paying for it.  When I left Italy at the beginning of this month, I carefully saved the  file for my WIP, and when I arrived back in NYC, I took up the draft again, adding to it. At least that was what I thought I was doing. In the process, I discovered that I had been working on two files, and that neither of them was completely up to date.  Matters got worse when I discovered a third version on my desk top that never made the trip.  UGH!

I didn't waste a lot of time mourning my loss.  For most of my life, "Just Keep Working" has been my answer in the face of adversity.  After two long days of working toward stitching the best parts back in order, I am three quarters of the way to where I thought I was three weeks ago.  Once I have the drafted chapters in the best possible shape, actual progress will ensue.  That's the plan.  And so, for this week on MIE, I offer you the best bits of one of my very first posts when I joined MIE as regular in 2013.

My thoughts about making art/entertainment and making it look easy:  

The actor Paul Newman once described in an interview an encounter he had with Spencer Tracy.  Newman was a young actor; the director of a movie allowed him to hang around the studio set in LA while Tracy was working.  One day, Tracy approached Newman and said, “They tell me you want to be an actor.”  Newman mumbled an affirmative answer.  Tracy grasped him by the shoulder and said, “Don’t ever let anyone catch you doing it.”

You couldn’t see Tracy doing it in this courtroom scene:

And when Newman got his turn, he followed Tracy’s advice.  Here is Newman in court:

THE prime example of making art look effortless is, of course, the dancing of Fred Astaire.  In his movies, his dances are shown with only one or two cuts.  Unlike more recent films where most dance sequences have more to do with editing, Astaire’s movies show him in performance.  To achieve this, Astaire did not just show up one day and wing it.  He typically rehearsed for three months before getting  in front of the camera.   He put day upon day of effort into perfecting dances that were going to be seen only on film, where they could be edited and re-edited.  But Astaire practiced them until he could dance them this effortlessly:

 

 To me, this is the very essence of grace.  (That's Eleanor Powell with him, by the way; no slouch she!)  Enormous work has gone in.  The performers have invested such heart, such determination, that the effort disappears, and all that the world sees is the unselfconscious art.

 

My motto: Work Conquers All

Here is one of my favorite ever reviews.  Of my first novel, for me it was the ultimate compliment.  

"Alfieri effortlessly recreates 17th-century Peru in her impressive debut... The author nicely balances action and deduction in a mystery that works as a political thriller as well as a historical whodunit."
- Publishers Weekly

It's back to work for me!