Writing For The Sake Of Story:

Notes On A Fiction Workshop By Richard Wagamese

By Jorge Antonio Vallejos

Photo by Jorge Antonio Vallejos

In October 2012, Richard Wagamese, an Ojibway who is a member of the Sturgeon Clan, gave a talk about fiction writing at the 5^th Indigenous Writers Gathering at First Nations House University of Toronto. 

With 11 books to his name, Wagamese, a survivor of the 60s Scoop, addiction, incarceration, and homelessness, shared stories about his life, culture, and craft.  Having only a grade 9 education Wagamese became an award winning journalist and author.  In this one talk Wagamese taught me more than many of my university professors. 

To Be A Writer You Must Be A Reader 

• “What I did do was immerse myself in the culture of books.”
• Libraries: “These places were mine.”
• One book opened a doorway to another.
• “I drowned in an ocean of words and images.”
• Read book reviews.
• Read two to three hours a day.
• Don’t limit yourself to your own cultural niche.  Read everything.
• Looking for appropriation of culture takes you away from the story.
• Look at how the story is being told.
• Reading adds elements and substance to your craft.

Study Speech/Dialogue

• “Dialogue is speech.”
• “Language is so magical.”
• “The way we talk to each other is literature.”
• Keep your ears open.  Listen in on conversations.
• Notebook carrying: “I scribbled what I thought they said.”
• Record conversations.
• Looks up words on un-busy days and uses them in sentences.

Wagamese’s Writing Process

• Yoga + meditation in the morning.
• Smudges and drinks tea.
• “I open up the channel that lives in all of us and I start to work.”
• Faces a blank screen every morning.
• “I work for the story’s sake.”
• Writes 3 to 4 hours every morning—7 publishable pages.
• “I breathe through my fingers.”
• “I’m writing there trying to find my own answers…trying to find my own views.”
• 1 draft writer.
• Wrote first book in 5 months.
• “Hit that bar and go over it!”
• “The final period completes the whole voyage.”

Spirituality

• “We were born on the breath of creation; we carry that breath within us.”
• Our nature is to be storytellers
• Feel the land: “The land will inform you.”
• “We reach out because we want to be connected.”

Faith

• “I was afraid to look like a stupid Indian.”
• “I had a hard time looking up because I was ashamed and afraid.”
• Find Another Indian To Hassle
• “I have faith now.  And that faith is a byproduct of courage.”
• The way you get into the fabric of a story comes from within you.

What You Need To Be A Writer

• Dedication
• Love of language
• Courage
• Belief

Advice

• “There’s a story calling you.  There’s a story in you that wants to be told.”
• Challenge yourself.
• “If you’re gonna live as a writer you have to live and die by the agreement you make with yourself.”
• Commit to yourself, your work, excellence.
• “You have to work dang hard!”
• Story lives in everything: music, theatre, dance, photos.
• Find your political peace.
• Hang your ego on the hook of the door of your writing space. 
• Mean what you say.
• Say what you mean.