Gone Fishing....

...for inspiration, for information, but not, it must be said, for fish.




Back in a couple of watery weeks...

Taking the Fifth Amendment

If somebody asks you what you are writing about, don't answer.  It's a question I go into contortions to avoid.  Change the subject, take the fifth, do what ever is necessary in order to keep schtum.  Even close the door in your questioner's face...

The reason for this is that the first telling of your story will always be the best, so you should put it down on paper before squandering it elsewhere.  Something is lost in the retelling.  Perhaps it's because you're trying to recapture the freshness and immediacy of your original vision. I take this to the nth degree and try not to even think about a key scene before I'm ready to write it, because I know that some of the energy will be dissipated, or I will get diverted by trying to remember that defining phrase which came to me a few days earlier.

Keeping your work private and secret conjures some illicit magic - it's a bit like having an affair, where the object of your obsession and desire is your own imagination.  Narcissistic, I know, but in its own mysterious way it seems to work...

Hearing your Voice

It's an uncomfortable feeling, listening to your own voice.  It brings with it the terrible realisation that this is how the world hears you -- high-pitched and breathy, or glottal-stopped - whatever it is, it is certainly different from the sound-proofed, private tone you hear inside your own head. In some weird way, it reveals more of you, the inner you, than you feel quite comfortable with.

The same is true of your writing voice.  It shines a bright light on preoccupations and neuroses of which you are barely aware yourself.  It parades your strengths and weaknesses for all to see.  To begin with, until you get used to it, until you get better at it, it's frankly embarrassing.

There are things that you can do to help to overcome this.  Reading is one.  The more you read, the more you discover how other people write -- it's a technical education that isn't available anywhere else and I'm absolutely positive that the elegance and assurance of good writing soon rubs off on an attentive reader.

The other thing to do is to keep writing (see my last post on inspiration/perspiration). Just as your speaking voice is a muscle, in a way your writing voice is as well, and regular exercises (as suggested here from time to time) will help to give it strength and definition.  By reading you will learn through example, by writing yourself you will learn through practice and by doing the two of them together you will gain in confidence so that your self-consciousness will eventually fade away.

It's No Good Waiting for Inspiration

You can put the idea for a novel or a short story down to inspiration, but the writing of it is much more like hard graft -- that old saw about writing being 10% inspiration and 90% perspiration is uncomfortably true.  Once you have an idea bubbling away inside your head, you can forget any thoughts about a muse descending.  If you wait for that to happen, you can find yourself waiting a very long time. The only way to bring your story from germination to realisation is to write it.

Probationary writers are often put off if the great idea that has captured their imagination fails to set the page alight when they come to write it down. They may plough on for a while, smarting with disappointment and embarrassment, until the gaps between writing sessions get longer and longer and and the number of words set down on paper gets smaller and smaller, until the whole thing is abandoned and forgotten.

However, if you loved your idea enough at the outset to want to write about it, then you may well be on to something and the only way to find out is to keep writing.  It doesn't matter if it feels a bit clunky to begin with, the important thing is to keep going.  If you are continually fiddling away with the first two or three pages, tweaking here, cutting there, that you will never get anywhere.  The literary equivalent of don't look down is don't look back. The time for editing is much later on in the creative process.  When you are starting out on a story, just write.  If it helps to sustain your stamina by having a cup of tea/making a phone call/listening to the afternoon episode of The Archers, that's fine, but don't stay away from your desk so long that you lose momentum.  Forward impetus is all that you need at the beginning -- everything else is dependent upon that.

For me, the creative additive that keeps me curious and motivated and engaged, is one of these...

...because they evoke so many questions. What's yours?

It's a Bit of a Cliche but...

I hate cliches.  Puffy white clouds? Bleugh! Clouds are always puffy.  How about swollen, for a change?At the very best, using cliches comes over as laziness, although the worst-case scenario indicates a complete lack of imagination and no self-respecting writer would want to take risks in either direction.

Write down your ten most hated cliches - dredge right down to the bottom of the barrel - and then see if you can provide a literary antidote to each of them: the most concise and revelatory description of which you are capable. This should help to sharpen your editorial eye so that you are alert to sloppy work, while at the same time providing you with creative stimulus.

NB There is only one situation in which it might conceivably be allowable to use a cliche and that is if it is a quirk one of your characters is prone to.  So I guess I'm saying it's okay to take stylistic risks like this if it is obviously something you consciously intend for literary effect, but not otherwise,

or you'll find yourself up shit creek without a paddle...

Growth Spurt

In my last but one post I was talking about how inconsistency in your characterisation can be a sign of both good and bad writing -- consciously done it can add verisimilitude, unconsciously done it ends up looking like carelessness.  Since I wrote that, I've been thinking how inconsistency -- doing something out of character -- can often be a spur to growth and to change, which are the most important objectives for any hero or heroine, so my theme for today's little sermon is growth.

The thing about growth is that it doesn't come easily -- it is not a gift which is given to you, it is something which is hard won and often wrung from you (or wrought in you) at huge personal cost.  This is what makes it worth having in the real world and interesting to read about in the fictional one. After several challenges and setbacks, it often requires a huge leap of faith -- everything will be all right, in the end -- to achieve.  That is what makes it inspiring for readers. Most of us operate within our comfort zones for most of the time, so being made to step outside one's own personal, protective circle is something we do with great reluctance. Seeing a hero or heroine catapulted into an unfamiliar situation where the stakes are high allows your readers vicariously to realise their own fears and dreams.

All of this is heady stuff, the fabric of exciting fiction.  Try writing a story that has at its heart growth and change which doesn't come easily to your main character.  It will probably test you to write about, but should make interesting reading....

Setting the Scene

It's a lovely hot day for a walk or a bicycle ride, so how's this for a creative writing task? Describe a journey you do frequently, as if you were writing a travel article.  Not only will this give you a chance to hone your journalistic style, it will also teach you to look at what is familiar with a fresh eye. Setting the scene and learning which detail matters and what can be discarded are important skills, especially when you are starting out on your writing life, so not only will this give you practice at those, it will also send you out into the wide blue yonder (on a blue bicycle??)

Charles Dickens used to say that it was important to spend an hour walking for every hour that you spend writing.  Off you go!

U Turns and other Inconsistencies

There's a world of difference between a beautifully-crafted character behaving inconsistently and the inconsistency that comes when a character is thrown together without much attention to detail, creating the impression that they are rather less than the sum of their parts.  The first is considered and deliberate, the second merely careless (or expedient -- sometimes a hero or heroine performs extraordinary U-turns in order to serve the plot.  Not a good idea.  The plot should spring organically from the way your protagonist interacts with situations and events). This kind of sloppiness will have any potential reader hurling your manuscript across the room.

You might, however, make productive use of the consequences which occur when a well-rounded, clearly defined character suddenly goes off the rails and does something untypical. It can have tremendous shock value, which is always a bonus, and sometimes it can send the story shooting off in a new direction. It will certainly give rise to a number of questions which you as the writer will then have to answer, so it will provide you with mileage and momentum.

Try writing a story that hinges on the heroine / hero behaving inconsistently. You have to pull off quite a difficult balancing act, ensuring that it is both plausible and surprising.

Irony

Irony is such a delicious tool for a writer -- it rebukes, it calls to account, it amuses; it is subtle and salty.  Just to be clear what we are talking about here, irony might be described as the conveyance of meaning, generally satirical, by words whose literal meaning is the opposite -- words of praise used as criticism etc. It is sarcasm's milder and much cleverer cousin, as it doesn't just deliver snide insults (although it is perfectly capable of that) it suggests a wider view of the world, or of a particular situation.  Jane Austen elevated the use of it to an art form, although that shouldn't frighten you off from having a go at it yourself - try writing a piece in which irony is the prevailing tone.

NB Today's door - see how the iron spikes are softened by shadowy fronds: irony is a bit like that, its barb softened by humour.