#writers process

[scriptwriters-network]

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[verba-writing]

Scientists that have studied squirrels think that their behaviour shows that they don't necessarily remember where they've hidden a nut haul, but that they create so many and come winter take 'lucky guesses'

This is how I create my WIPs; like a forgetful squirrel. I make so many and hope I get back to one often enough that it becomes a 'good one'.

[eirian-houpe]

What is your ideal writing environment? Is there a particular place you tend to write? Do you prefer silence, or background noise? etc.

Thank you for your question, and here’s were I prove that I’m a bit of a weirdo when it comes to writing - or maybe it’s something that I have ‘learned’ in order to be able to do the writing I do...

I don’t really have an ideal writing environment. I mean, I have deams that I think my writing environment would be, (think log cabin in the mountains somewhere), but the reality is I write wherever I happen to be when I have a moment to write, and I write whenever I have a moment to do it. If I didn’t - there’d be no writing done at all. I learned to adapt I guess.

When I started writing (as a kid) I wrote in my bedroom - which I shared with my sibling, so I didn’t always get peace and quiet.

When I returned to writing many MANY years later, I was in a relationship where my partner really didn’t value my writing at all - didn’t really value anything much at all actually. I had to learn to write amid noise and constant interruptions.

When we separated, and I went back home, writing was back in my bedroom, which at least was quieter, but no less interruptions.

Now I’m lucky to be as close to that dream I mentioned up... ^ there somewhere - fairly secluded, with someone who cares about my needs a great deal, and gives me time to write, encourages it. The interruptions now come from animals who have somehow learned to tell the time and gods forbid that ‘mummy’ should not see to their needs when they expect it.  The interruptions also come from adulting which is not as amusing or endearing as needy pets.

If I /really/ want to focus though, I’ll put on some music - preferably without words (usually movie or tv show soundtracks) and use headphones. Not always without words though.  I once wrote an entire fic for an old NBC show called UC:Undercover, listening to Peter Gabriel’s “Blood of Eden” over and over and over again, on repeat basically. Don’t know whether I love or loathe that song now, I listened to it so often...

[layzcreature0]

“There is only one thing a writer can write about: what is in front of his senses at the moment of writing... I am a recording instrument... I do not presume to impose “story” “plot” “continuity”... Insofar as I succeed in Direct recording of certain areas of psychic process I may have limited function... I am not an entertainer...”

William S. Burroughs "Naked Lunch"

[writersbone]

When the kids were little, my time was as soon as they left for school. So I worked very hard in those years. My husband and I owned a bookstore, and even when I was working there, I stayed at home until noon. I was supposed to be doing housework, and I would also do my writing then. Later on, when I wasn’t working everyday in the store, I would write until everybody came home for lunch and then after they went back, probably till about two-thirty, and then I would have a quick cup of coffee and start doing the housework, trying to get it all done before late afternoon.

Alice Munro, The Paris Review 

In the same interview, she talks about writing in her and her husband’s bookstore: 

I went down to the bookstore, which wasn’t open Sundays, and locked myself in. My husband had said he would get dinner, so I had the afternoon. I remember looking around at all the great literature that was around me and thinking, You fool! What are you doing here? But then I went up to the office and started to write the section called “Princess Ida,” which is about my mother.

[shotguncartel]

Never have a muse, they are addictive.

I used to have a muse. She was hot, her flame burned bright, thoughts quick, always on point, I wanted to possess her, wreck her. I didn't matter what the hour was or the topic or people surrounding us, it didn't. She just kept inspiring me, urging me on, completing my thoughts sometimes before I could muster to shape them into words.

It all crashed and burned, as it often does with a muse. Unattainable, breaks your heart, dances away from you when you have finally gotten close enough to touch.

I miss that. I miss having that one person who'll never be yours, who you can't trap or seduce into submissiveness, but she'll still be there every time you need it. Willingly. Because she is as fascinated by you as you are by her.

I want a muse. I need a muse. I want you to capture me and break my heart. Artistically. Because now I can't write, and I want to, but every plot, every word -- it lacks depth.

I should give up. I should go and try to find that spark, that connection. I should, I should, I should. I can't.

So now I am on my own.

It's lonely here.