This time all the historical details and things were right. But I'd written it again in third person, and people found it dry. I decided to throw that one away.
The Ritz in London has an old-fashioned charm, with waiters wearing tails and white gloves. The dining room is exquisite, with immaculate service and ornate details.
Really good writing, from my perspective, runs a lot like a visual on the screen. You need to create that kind of detail and have credibility with the reader, so the reader knows that you were really there, that you really experienced it, that you know the details. That comes out of seeing.
The details of the personal expenses that executives put on the company tab often are not known because loopholes in federal disclosure rules let publicly traded companies generally avoid disclosing the perks they give executives along with pay and stock options.
I don't inflict horrors on readers. In my research, I've uncovered truly terrible documentations of cruelty and torture, but I leave that offstage. I always pull back and let the reader imagine the details. We all know to one degree or another the horrors of war.
Furnishing a home is no different than going into the studio and making music. You want to make sure you've pared down all the extra details so that in the end, every stitch has a context uniquely yours.
The bearing, rearing, feeding and educating of children; the running of a house with its thousand details; human relationships with their myriad pulls - women's normal occupations in general run counter to creative life, or contemplative life, or saintly life.
I was worried that one day, 40 years from now, I would look back and wouldn't be able to remember the details of my life, so I've written them all down.
It is the lone worker who makes the first advance in a subject; the details may be worked out by a team, but the prime idea is due to enterprise, thought, and perception of an individual.
My religion consists of a humble admiration of the illimitable superior spirit who reveals himself in the slight details we are able to perceive with our frail and feeble mind.
