Some of you may have seen this story already, but I’m sure we can all sympathise with the panic of the writer who learned that his house was on fire—within, was his laptop, on which were two completed novels.
I back up my work on a memory stick and in the cloud—I hope you do too unless you’re a good runner!
From the Guardian, a useful article full of wise advice from well-known authors.
My best writing tip by William Boyd, Jeanette Winterson, Amit Chaudhuri and more
I like what Blake Morrison has to say about going with the flow, embracing change when new ideas appear about how to tackle a scene. After all, if the writer isn’t intrigued by what’s going to happen next, why should the reader care?
I don’t recall talking about this fearsome obstruction before, and I came across an opinion by the great Philip Pullman, with which I heartily agree:
‘I don’t believe in it (writer’s block). All writing is difficult. The most you can hope for is a day when it goes reasonably easily. Plumbers don’t get plumber’s block, and doctors don’t get doctor’s block; why should writers be the only profession that gives a special name to the difficulty of working, and then expects sympathy for it?’
I’ve never suffered from being ‘blocked’. I didn’t do any creative writing for years, but that was more down to depression and a lack of self-belief. I know that it could be argued that not believing in yourself is the cement that holds writer’s block together, but there are still techniques to get things flowing again.
If I stop feeling the creative flow, slipping out of the groove, I’ll do something else. Editing is always there, and it’s sufficient purgatory to encourage a return to creative writing. An alternative is to make plans for future novels in my series Cornish Detective crime novels, jotting down ideas and web addresses for relevant research in folders on my desktop. I find that writing poetry or song lyrics sometimes frees up ideas relevant to my WIP.
If you are affected by writer’s block, just consider what it’s made of. It could be a great big block of sugar, which (forgive the crudity) will dissolve if you just pee on it. By that, I mean release your inner demon— writing down what makes you mad about books in general, how you hate specific characters in your story and how the hell did that author get published when you can’t find an agent? Your anger is mightier than any temporary glitch.
A more genteel way to destroy an obstruction is to go around it. If you’re stuck on chapter 18, throw some paper airplane messages ahead for what occurs in chapter 20. Whether you’re a ‘planner’ or a ‘pantser’ you’ve still got an idea of where your story is headed, so jot down key phrases you intend to use, chuck in an unexpected development or think of a way to include a favourite word you’ve always wanted to use.
Creating a book is like taking a walk in a forest—there’s more than one path through the trees.
Have any of you been blocked, and how did you deal with it?
I was thinking about which authors I love, that I wish were more widely read, after finishing a novel by John Williams. He’s been acclaimed in recent years, finally receiving recognition for his wonderful story Stoner.
Set in academia, the plot sounds slight, concerning the career of an English professor and his dutiful ways and thwarted love life, but the writing is powerful and memorable.
John Williams only wrote two volumes of poetry and four novels, which were all different in subject matter. I recently enjoyed Butcher’s Crossing. This would probably be classified as a Western, and shelved in that genre in a bookshop, owing to its 19th-century setting, but it’s writing of the highest order. There are no gunfights, but plenty of gore; it reminded me of Moby Dick in the way it portrayed a man’s obsession and flawed relationship with Nature. John Williams is definitely one of The Good.
Bad writers are legion, and, unfortunately, they often prosper. I’ve pilloried Jeffrey Archer before on this blog, so won’t go into a rant. Sufficient to say, the man is a scoundrel and horse-whipping is too good for him. For those of you not familiar with his loathsome career:
Jeffrey Archer – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
He writes with the skill of an illiterate ten-year-old, yet his novels have sold millions. It goes to prove that it’s not what you can do, but who you know that counts when seeking recognition. His contacts in the business world helped to launch his career, saving him from bankruptcy.
As for The Meh, writers who are lauded but who leave me cold, there are quite a few. Sadly, they often write what is known as ‘Literature’. By that I mean, more than anything, they are taken seriously by critics, win awards, appear at literary festivals as the main attraction and their opinions are sought on global affairs. They’re admired for their intellectualism, but their ability to tell a story leaves me going ‘huh?’
Something tells me, that Jonathan Franzen, Paul Auster and Douglas Coupland would have a hard job telling a decent joke, and I’m not sure I’d want to be seated next to them at a dinner party.
Who do you love, hate and feel apathy for?
(I just had a thought—perhaps one’s reading tastes would make a perfect predictor of compatibility in a romantic relationship!)
After spending five months at the beginning of 2015 researching the likes, dislikes, blogs, tweets and YouTube videos of literary agents, and querying 160 of them to a chorus of rejections and total silence, I’ve since run two more campaigns of querying, bringing my total of submissions to 690!
I’ve written five novels in my series featuring a Cornish detective, so can pick and choose which title to use to query. Most agents reply within six months, with the quickest taking only two hours! I have a hide like a rhinoceros, so take rejections philosophically.
I’ve learnt a lot about the querying process, for, like editing, creating a blurb and a synopsis or self-publishing on Smashwords and Amazon, you have to do it to appreciate the problems and refine your technique.
To my astonishment, two form letter rejections came in during the last week. I queried both agencies 16 months ago! It’s polite for them to eventually reply, though I now have an image of them buried under piles of manuscripts, their hard drives clogged with queries as they labour to say ‘No’ to legions of hopeful writers.
Can any of you beat this record?
I’ve completed five novels in a series about a Cornish detective. I’m making plans for the sixth story and am feeling optimistic about the future. I don’t feel like I should be doing anything else, other than writing.
I recently read Haruki Murakami’s What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, which while about running, is also revealing about his creativity. Murakami is very good at letting the reader into his thought processes, something he also does with the characters in his novels. Their internal dialogue is gripping, and it’s something I try to emulate with my novels.
This article in Flavorwire, where famous authors give their reasons for writing, made me ponder my own motivations for writing.
15 Famous Authors on Why They Write
I agree with what they say about it being a solace, source of happiness, a delight and a way of expressing myself on something. It also has a feeling of making my mark, leaving some trace of who I am. I’m not suggesting that I’m striving for immortality, for it’s a sad fact that a tiny number of writers are remembered by name through history.
How many of you have heard of J.P. Marquand?
He was a hugely successful writer in the early 20th century, reaching millions of readers and winning the Pulitzer Prize for literature, yet today he’s forgotten. I came across him as an answer to a crossword clue, which might be an apt comment on the transience of success.
So, why do you do it?
Why do you write?
( Showing off is a good reason!)
I’ve gradually refined my working method, since returning to creative writing six years ago. With my first novel, I did some editing as I went along, but the bulk of it gripped me like a grizzly bear after I’d typed ‘The End’. Five months of editing saw me interacting with my story as a recalcitrant object, rather than an interesting crime novel, as I hunted down punctuation errors, repetitions and clumsy phrasing.
These days, after completing my fifth novel, I edit assiduously as I go along. Some writing experts recommend using a word processor not connected to the internet, which I understand if you’re easily distracted by emails and social media, but I prefer to research facts close to writing about them. I do tons of fact checking beforehand, two months worth for my last story, but there are still times when details need refining.
In this way, I don’t trouble myself with reaching a set word count each day. Nor do I worry about finishing a chapter. Instead, I’ve taken to leaving off writing when I reach an intriguing development that poses questions of the protagonists. This usually happens after many hours of writing, when I’m also feeling weary.
Several famous authors recommended a similar approach, including Ernest Hemingway, who stopped when he still had an idea about what might happen next but didn’t want to empty the well of his imagination. There’s a difference between dropping anchor to moor safely, and foundering on a reef.
I’ve also adopted a trick suggested by Thomas Edison: Never go to sleep without a request to your subconscious. In this way, my brain sometimes offers solutions to a predicament while I sleep, that I wouldn’t have thought of when awake.
When do you stop yourself writing?
A great joke product, along the lines of bottled air:
I wonder how long it will be before someone comes up with an app to produce book mites crawling across the screen of your Kindle….
It’s been said by various fine minds, T.S. Eliot, Steve Jobs and Alfred Tennyson included, that: ‘Good Artists copy; great artists steal.’
I don’t mean plagiarism, where long sections of a previously published work are lifted and used by an inferior writer; there have been many examples of that through the years.
Nor do I mean the alarming theft of whole ebooks which are hijacked, given a new title and published online under a pen name by ratbags wanting to profit from an author’s hard work.
No, I’m referring to when we read a phrase or see a literary technique that we can ‘borrow’ and turn to our purpose. To a large extent, we writers are magpies picking up anecdotes, interesting snippets of language and overheard conversations to decorate our own nests.
We’re always ‘on’, especially with a WIP, alert to possibilities. Just recently, I came across a couple of choice descriptions in a novel and a poem. One was in Tim Gautreaux’s fine novel The Missing where he described some dilapidated store fronts ‘faced with cupped pine boards bleeding nail rust’. I loved the idea of old dried-out timber bleeding nail rust, so purloined it to add to a scene where my protagonist detective visits a seemingly abandoned ramshackle farm, only to find the farmer dead inside, sitting mummified at his kitchen table.
A charming poem An Hour by Polish bard Czeslaw Milosz spoke of the ‘zealous hum of bees’. Yoink went I, adding it to my opening chapter where a mysterious woman is lying among the heather on a hot summer day, before going to a rendezvous with a man who will murder her.
That’s my confession!
Have any of you stolen anything juicy recently?
(Fess up—it’s good for the soul)
The latest bulletin from Zen Pencils was delivered to my inbox this morning. It’s a piece of advice from Timothy Leary, the counter-culture psychologist, author and pioneer of psychedelic drugs, about how we need to search to find ‘The Others’—fellow members of whatever tribe we belong to.
102. TIMOTHY LEARY: You aren’t like them
Then I wondered, in a whimsical way, about how I’d recognise a fellow writer out in the wild. Would they be like me, somewhat distracted and living in their fictional world, scribbling down ideas on a shopping list as they navigated the supermarket aisle. Possibly they’d be muttering to themselves, as dialogue was tried out and rejected.
In a library or bookshop, an author with a work in progress might have an expression that mixed delight at being among books, along with annoyance when they saw the works of a writer they despised and whose success they didn’t understand.
For my own part, I spend so much time alone indoors writing and editing, only venturing outside for a couple of hours a week to shop for food, that I sometimes feel like a creature on parole from a zoo’s nocturnal collection. A bushbaby blinking at the light, wondering at all of the people going about their normal business.
