Inspiration and writing
Adelaide Writers' Week 2010, Pioneer Women's Memorial Gardens
From where for you draw your inspiration as a writer?
I guess there are as many answers to that question as there are writers! It always intrigues me when writers say that they don’t know what to write about. I rarely have that problem. I can see ideas for writing all around: in the every day events of life, in the experiences of life, in the environment, in the fascinating people we come into contact with daily, in the newspapers, in things we read, in films, television programmes and so on and so on. So writers just need to open their eyes to the whole world of ideas for writing out there just waiting for a poem, a story, an article or an essay to be written.
In recent weeks I have written about my impressions of attending this year’s Adelaide Writers’ Week held as a part of the current Festival of Arts. During one of the sessions I couldn’t find a seat in the big marquee, so I sat in the shade of one of the beautiful trees which are a feature of the Women’s Pioneer Memorial Gardens where the sessions were held. It was a lovely day: bright sunshine, not too hot, gentle breeze and wonderful speakers to enlighten and entertain us.
I looked up into the trees above.
Beautiful.
I just had to take several photos to share with you here. I will use these photos, and the wonderful setting, as inspiration for some writing. The only problem now is to decide whether I write an article, a short story, a poem – perhaps a beautiful sonnet – or a blog post about those lovely trees, the sunshine filtering softly through the leaves, the birds singing overhead in the branches or some other response.
Be inspired – and use that for good writing.
Adelaide Writers' Week 2010, Pioneer Women's Memorial Gardens
Adelaide Writers' Week 2010, Pioneer Women's Memorial Gardens
Writers and the inner critic
One of the international speakers at the recent Adelaide Writers Week was crime and historical fiction writer Sarah Dunant. I managed to catch her talks several times. I didn’t take too many notes but I did record one significant statement she made.
Writers: tell the inner critic on your shoulder: “Leave the room, close the door and I’ll invite you back in when I’ve written and we’ll analyse it together.” Sarah Dunant 2010
The inner critic plagues many writers. Sometimes it is like a demon sitting there so belligerently that the writer is frozen by inaction. Feelings of not being able to write creep in, along with their cousins telling the writer that he or she will never be a good writer. ‘You’re only deluding yourself,’ they cry. Try something sensible, like bomb disposal or rocket science. Go become something easier like a brain surgeon.
Self doubt and self criticism is common. Writers need to shrug them off and just write. Get down the story, let it take on a momentum of its own and just get it written – no matter how rough it seems.
Then when the first draft is finished, invite the critic back into the process and go through your writing meticulously, mercilessly and ruthlessly until the writing is so polished that it sparkles like a well-cut diamond.
Good writing.
- To read more about Adelaide Writers’ Week click here.
- To read more about Sarah Dunant click here.
Sarah Dunant at Adelaide Writers Week 2010
Writer’s block
I’m struggling to write.
Now this is a common problem experienced by most writers. Over the last three months I have had many distractions which have kept me from the key board.
- Things like going away for several short holidays with family.
- Things like spending wonderful time with my grandson – and his parents.
- Things like catching up with family over Christmas.
- Things like celebrating my wife’s birthday with friends – it was one of the big one! (Ssssh – I won’t mention her age)
- Things like getting jobs done around the house that had been studiously ignored during the year.
Probably the most concerning, however, has been a deterioration of my health. Several things have made concentrating on my writing very difficult. This is where persistence comes into play. Over the last few days I’ve gradually pushed through the disappointments and difficulties and persisted with my writing. Sometimes it has been easy, sometimes very challenging.
As I see it now, my priority over the coming months will be to keep on steadily writing while being careful to pace myself and care for my health.
Good writing.
My latest publishing venture
Now for something a little different.
I’ve had another poem published, this time in a small collection of poems called a chap book. There’s quite a story to this poem being published.
Every month I attend a poetry writers’ group at the university where I have almost completed my Master of Arts in Creative Writing. Poetry writing has been a love of mine for decades, but it is only now that I’m having some small publication successes. Poetry was a big part of the course and my skills have definitely improved in the last 2 years.
Every month we set a poetry writing challenge for the next meeting. One of the challenges last year was to write a poem on the theme of poverty (the Global Financial Crisis even crept into our little group). Some of the poems were brilliant and deserved a much wider audience than the group. We decided that this was to be the the first compilation published by the group.
I was nominated to be one of the three editors and I also set up the design of the booklet. We called it Shifting Sands. We had a very successful launch at our monthly meeting last Thursday. Normally we might only have about 5-7 members attend. This time we had 14 people present (including 3 new members) despite at least 3 or our regular attendees being away.
This month our theme was New Year’s Resolutions and the standard was extremely high. As a result we are now planning our next publication.
Good writing.