Thursday 3 May 2012

Writing Tim's narrative

I HAD a few abortive starts to the novel, in which I tried to come at the project from a radical angle, but neither did I just want to regurgitate the screenplay…

I guess I didn’t want to tire of the same characters and situations, but also writing prose is really quite different from screenwriting. The two don’t necessarily lend themselves to each other.

Therefore I really evolved a host of new characters out of the screenplay, and it seemed to work really well. Lots of people ask me what it’s like co-writing a novel, but to be honest it went incredibly smoothly, and there wasn’t any conflict between Martin and me.

In fact, you could argue that it was half as difficult as writing a novel by yourself, in that I only had to write half a book!

The fact is that the narratives were distinct; Jock and his men are preparing for the match while Tim and his pals are on the road, so, as I already said, there wasn’t that much scope for overlap. Having a co-author meant that we could bounce ideas off one another, and, just as importantly, edit each other’s text.

The fact that we are both experienced editors (we work in newspapers) meant that this was meat and drink to us, and it meant that any submission was liable to be of a cleaner, better structured standard than usual.

The fact is that if you have a clear, shared vision, and you are naturally respectful towards folk, the process needn’t be a difficult one, and it wasn’t.

In terms of that vision, as we are from Celtic-supporting families, we both understood at quite a profound emotional level what Lisbon actually represented. That’s a matter for later blogs (and the book itself!) but suffice to say that we were both writing on the same emotional pitch.

I should also mention Mark ‘Stan’ Stanton, who is an agent with Jenny Brown. Stan told us that he ‘loved’ our initial offerings, and obviously he went on to sell the book to Birlinn.

In fact, Stan had given initial encouragement not long after Martin had come up with the idea, and even before I had come on board.

I also have to mention Pete Burns at Birlinn, who, like Stan, saw the merit of the idea, and it’s been a pleasure working with him. Clearly Stan and Pete have excellent taste!

Charles McGarry

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