I've set myself a challenge for February.
Every day of this month I'm going to complete 15 minutes of copy work. Not a lot of time really but by the end of the month that will be 7 hours spent copying the work of writers I admire.
I've done odd bits of copy work before and have found it a useful exercise. It's a great way of close reading. I find it almost like a cheat: like I'm hot-wiring the ability to engage deeply with a text. All I have to do is copy it out and I automatically start noticing things that I can simply take note of.
I've started this morning with Gabriel Josipovici's short story, 'Christmas'. It's a great story that's heavy on dialogue. Narration is striped down to the bare minimum to keep us moving forward.
Already there is so much to be gained from this story:
Its ability to draw attention to facets of the story's background with little more than a few well chosen words in a line of dialogue
How little narration you really need to progress a scene
The way it builds tension and intrigue by withholding information to make the reader a part of the story's creation
The way characters become defined by their relationships and interactions with one another.
Day 1 done. 27 more to go.