Literature is the transcription of thoughts and emotions, as the authors experienced and felt them, in words. So should their translations be.

Literal translations are devoid of the original authors' thoughts and emotions.

If you can practice sleeping without silence, you will eventually be able to write without silence.

It is your duty as a writer to be unstoppable with your writing.

Never write while consciously eluding revelations about yourself. Writing is truth. If you must disguise yourself from your readers, edit and tweak your work much later--after your creative process is complete.

As a writer, keep yourself steady in the background. Do not desire pomp and publicity--they are bad for your mind.

Writers and artists download all sorts of references for everything. Go ahead and do so, taking care to delete stuff and clean up your reference storage from time to time.

Many writers make the mistake of thinking up a great title and then proceeding to write the work. This is a glossy-magazine, non-literary, method, and is the very sequence that leads to writer's block and Procrustean thinking.

Write the work first. You will discover that the work will give itself the right title after you are done.

The same is true of painting.

Dramaturging for TheatreWorks Singapore: Beverly

Hello Beverly!

It was a great pleasure to go over your play once again. From beginning to end, I felt that I was reading the work of a modern Singaporean reincarnation of August Strindberg.

You worked so hard on this play, and all of it was worth it. Your characters have more depth, and your lines are crisp. I see that most of your major changes are in the second half of the play, and, this time around, the ending is upbeat and uplifting. It is also very clear that you have actually been visualizing the staging of the play because of the new movement of characters and your indications of lighting.

One of the issues we discussed was whether to include the other woman or not. You deliberated writing two versions--one with three characters, the other with four--and opted to give me this three-character version as your final manuscript. You were right: this is the better and the most sensible version.

The last time I met you, you were tormented about how much you desired this play to be a masterpiece, and you couldn't pinpoint why it was such an important work to you. You could not understand why this felt to you like an epic work--this story inspired by a real-life, relationship situation.

I think I should already tell you why, now that you have completed writing the play and it has finally taken shape.

This play is not just about a woman and two men. This play is about your country, Singapore. GIRL is every Singaporean who looks like she is torn between two men and cannot understand why she cannot be allowed to be devoted to both. As to what the two men represent, I leave it up to your imagination and interpretation. Well done--I hope that students study the definitive, post-production version of this play in every classroom.

A few minor details for improvement:

Scour the play and see where you can exercise economy and realism in dialogue. For example, in Act 1, Scene 1, Lines 8-9, the line goes "We can have your favorite chocolate cake I bought from Blossom Bakery" can really just be "I bought your favorite". Between husband and wife, that the favorite is chocolate cake should be understood and unspoken, also that they usually buy this at Blossom Bakery and nowhere else.

Also, Last Line on Page 2, "Don't call me Tinkerbell!" should actually be just "Don't call me that!" since she should not articulate the name and hear it all over again. DAN's reply, "What? But you love it when I call you that..." could also just be "You love it when I call you that."

On the other hand there are vague lines that should be more specific, such as on Page 29, in the 3rd to the Last Line, "I was hurt when you went home". Give it more impact by rewriting it into "I was hurt when you went BACK home TO HER."

Act 1, Scene 2 contains too much exposition. I know that it is for the benefit of the audience, but you need to figure out how to introduce and sustain dramatic tension in an otherwise dreamy, romantic scene.

Opening of Act 2, Scene 3: Why is the miming necessary? It doesn't go with the rest of the form. Just proceed to GIRL's first line. Otherwise this is a case of double exposition.

All of these will be clarified by a reading, which will open your ears, and so go ahead and set up a reading with blocking. Since it seems that I will be in Singapore again this year, I want to sit in on the reading, if possible.

My warmest regards to all.