Amy Tan’s Creativity Code, Cracked

How to tell a tale? Ask a master. Amy Tan spins stories with an unsubtle dazzle of magic. Yet hers aren’t overwhelmed by make believe because the characters are conniving, terrified and tender. In short, savagely human. Even those you have nothing in common with become like sisters, through their transparent truth and beauty. Like the barely teenage girl living with her young husband’s family, who work her like an indentured servant and berate her for not producing a son. That her husband won’t touch her is also her fault. A situation as alien to most modern women in this country, as being able to try on something quickly in H&M. (Seriously, are they paying people to loiter in there?)

Back to the point (thanks ADD meds!), there’s a richness to Amy Tan’s stories that lead one, and apparently, TED to ask… how the hell do you do it? As with all rambling writers she tries to answer this impossible question in the last 5 minutes of her speech. The gist of which is that she puts herself in the story to encourage an authenticity of character and intention. As the story richens, a distinction between author and story allows the two to separate. Is she an egomaniac? Maybe. But her explanation makes more sense. She has to become the story to understand how things happen. And only by understanding how things happen, can she make things happen. It sounds so easy. I think I’ll put this theory to test in my next radio spot for cat litter.