Losing that Lovin’ Feeling Blog Hop!

Thanks to Deb Nam-Krane and Caroline Fardig for putting together this Blog Hop! And thanks to Kerrie Olzak for the previous installment!

Most people who know me really well know that I tend to get a little obsessive over my entertainment options. High school and college saw me glued to and completely obsessed with General Hospital. That was killed by the mob – both my obsession and the show. As a grade-schooler, it was the Little House books and TV show. As an adult, I revisited General Hospital (with the same sad result), shared a Harry Potter addiction with my son (a series that never disappointed me), and fell in love and had my heart broken by Laurell K. Hamilton’s vampire hunter series, Anita Blake. (which inspired me to write my own vampire book, The Ties that Bleed.)

But none of those compared to my obsessed with the TV show M*A*S*H. As a middle-schooler, in the days before VCRs, I would record episodes on my tape recorder, listen to them over and over again, type them up and distribute them to my friends, whom I pretty much bullied into sharing my obsession. Thanks to the world of syndicated reruns, I was able to watch my favorite show over and over again. I “shipped” Hawkeye and Hot Lips before shipping was cool (and before Sam and Diane on Cheers made sit-com couples a thing.) I wrote fan fiction.

The series ended in 1983 (with a big goodbye kiss between my favorite non-couple that warmed my heart) and so did my obsession. However, with the advent of DVD players and ubiquitous cheap DVD collections, I was able to buy the entire series (plus the movie that started it all) and keep it with me forever and forever.

Other things happened between then and now. For instance, I got old. I also tried juggling a career and motherhood for a while. I became more politically aware. I started paying a lot more attention to current events. I became addicted to other series.

A few months ago, I returned to some of my favorite episodes of the series. I tend to circle back to the earlier ones, which were long on comedy and short on life lessons, especially the ones that featured lots of scenes of my favorite non-couple together. What I saw broke my heart. Sexism and even misogyny disguised as humor. Actions that illustrate what is now called a “hostile work environment.” What I had taken for sexual tension was hostility over female power.

One episode, “Check Up,” centered around the camp all getting physicals, with the result that Trapper John is diagnosed with an ulcer. Hawkeye assigned himself the task of evaluating Hot Lips alone in her tent. He makes several sexually suggestive remarks during the exam. (A similar scene happens in an episode where everyone in the camp gets the flu, and he insists on giving her a flu shot in the derriere.) When she turns him down, he tells her she needs to lose 10 pounds (the character is obviously at a normal weight) and makes fun of the shape of her legs. Later, Hot Lips’s insecurity over her looks drives her to get drunk at Trapper John’s farewell party and throw herself at him. After watching the episode, I felt sick.

Although Hawkeye aggressively flirts with Hot Lips in many episodes during the earlier part of the series, it obvious he doesn’t like her. She’s a major and he’s a captain, so even though he’s a doctor and she’s a nurse, she outranks him. She’s career army and believes in the mission of the war; he’s a draftee who believes everyone in government and military is a clown. There’s no real attraction between them at this point –he uses sex and humor to keep her in her place. She’s a woman and a nurse; he’s a man and a doctor; when she pulls rank on him, he (figuratively) pulls out his dick.

I’m not the only one who ships this couple, and I and the other shippers cling to the episode “Comrade in Arms,” when the two actually get together, as nirvana. It’s a two-part episode; they hook up at the end of part 1; in part 2 Hawkeye wakes up with Hot Lips in his arms, already regretting the assignation even before she regains consciousness. In most of this episode, Hot Lips plays entirely against character, trying to build a relationship with Hawkeye, who’s desperately trying to keep her at arm’s length. It’s the ultimate insult to the character (and written by Alan Alda, the actor who played Hawkeye). This episode has always made me angry (I even wrote a fan fiction version of part two that was more in line with Hot Lips’s character several years ago; if you read it, please note that I wrote it many years before I had taken a single screenwriting course!), but not until I took another look at the earlier dynamic between the two of them did I pinpoint the reason why. This two-parter shows that sex, rather than a culmination of passionate feelings, was more about Hawkeye finally taking his place on top of her. (His “let’s be friends” speech at the end of the episode is a continuation of this dynamic.)

I’m not 11 years old anymore, but these realizations broke my heart. I’d often wondered if M*A*S*H had lasted a year or two longer, if the two would have gotten together in the manner of other sit-com couples. And while later episodes of the show toned down the sexist humor (and one episode, guest starting Meryl Streep, even called out Hawkeye on his sexism), Hawkeye never really saw any of his potential love interests as more than a one-night stand. His most enduring relationships were with Trapper and BJ – other male doctors he respected as equals.

That M*A*S*H collection still has a place of honor on my bookshelf of DVD collections. But I think the next time I want to revisit my past obsessions, I may pull out some of my old General Hospital DVDs instead, which showcased female doctors in the 1970s.

Don’t forget to “tune in tomorrow” to see what’s disappointed Caroline Fardig!

Ten Copy-Editing Tips

I’ve been overwhelmed with copy-editing work lately, which has been good for my bank account but not so good for keeping up with the blog. Copy-editing helps me as a writer, because when I notice issues in other people’s manuscripts, they stand out in mine as well. Here’s a quick list of ten tips I picked up while evaluating work. These are in no order; I’m just going through a manuscript I recently finished and picking them out. I hope it helps you in your next go-round!

1. Fire the gun. Anton Chekhov famously wrote that if you refer to a gun in act one, it has to go off in act three. The corollary is also true: If a gun fires in act three, you have to place it in act one. But even objects less important than guns and gun shots need to be established before they become important. If a character throws a phone at her boyfriend, make sure you’ve placed the phone in her hand before she throws it.

2. Suddenly, last summer. Everything happens suddenly. Get rid of this word every time you see it. “The door opened” is more effective, and less Snoopyish, than “Suddenly, the door opened.”

3. Be careful to distinguish your narrative voice as the author from your characters’ internal narration. If you’re writing in third person, you’ll need to describe things dispassionately, while your characters will have their built-in biases in their voices. Don’t mix up the two.

4. Structure your sentence around your strongest possible verb. Don’t write “He gave her an angry look.” Write “He glared at her.”

5. Don’t over-explain. Readers don’t need to be told that a character got up from the couch, walked across the room, grasped the door knob, turned it, and pulled open the door. “Got up to answer the door” is fine. They will fill in the blanks.

6. “and then” are not a couple. “He took off his shirt, and then she pulled off his undershirt.” Delete “and.” “Then” will be fine without her.

7. Use vocabulary that matches your characters’ backgrounds. A high-school drop-out would not use Latin phrases. A PhD candidate would not make subject/verb errors.

8. Don’t repeat yourself, or say the same thing twice. When we edit our own work, we’re usually aware when we repeat the same word. But phrases can be repetitive without being duplicative. For instance, “There were no discernable bullets that she could see.”

9. “At” and “to” are not your friends. “He whispered to her.” “She smirked at him.” The reader knows who those gestures are for. Getting rid of your “to”s and “at”s cleans up your copy and brings down your word count.

10. Whether or not you agree with me, you only need “whether.” “Or not” is understood.

Ten tips, and I only scanned the first twenty pages of the last manuscript I turned in. I’ll do the next twenty if this is helpful!