A Writer's Process: Kate A. Hardy

I used to have a boyfriend whose creative processes came to life at about two in the morning.

He could work all night, cocooned in his dimly lit room, working on scripts and emerge briefly at around six in the morning when I was feeling at my most artistically productive . . . needless to say, the relationship didn’t last.

    And so it has continued. Six-thirty in the morning, in bed, with tea, that’s my writing time. The day hasn’t really started, lists of stuff to be done, safely downstairs. Dreams still cling and the previous days visual and audial impressions have been stocked ready for use – consciously or subconsciously. On the rare occasions that I don’t work at that time I feel slightly distracted all day, a niggling cloud hovering over my personal horizon.

    So, the writing process itself . . . I want to make structure but often (mostly) that seems to be an elusive thing, less so for short stories – an idea presents itself and refuses to go away until written down at least in a skeletal form. As they are short (5,000 or so words) it’s easier to craft a structure, a beginning, middle and end.

  Novels, for me, are more of a vast plane stretching out with a million possibilities

However much I try to plan, they take on a form of their own – usually fabricated by the characters themselves who seem to decide themselves what is about to happen next.

    This spontaneous form of working is exciting and I never find myself staring at a blank page wondering where to go next, however it does mean a lot of work later, rewriting, figuring out plot continuity elements and reining in the more ‘tangenty’ aspects of my writing.

    After my early morning a start, real life starts to encroach.

I pack up the ideas for a while and deal with the everyday. At some point I will walk dogs. For my writing process it’s vital to walk and think, look at trees, clouds, buildings, peoples’ gardens, etc. Most ideas seem to spring from my body being engaged in movement – swimming, particularly.

    Throughout the day, when possible, I will edit and re-write, write blogs and generally carry out stuff associated with writing, but the actual, real writing is an early morning activity; anything I ever write late at night will be stilted, probably incomprehensible and will need to be deleted at six-thirty the following morning . . .    

Writing Effortlessly

There are two things in my life, particularly, that have always invigorated me, and that I’ve instinctually known how to do without strain. Writing is not one of them (unfortunately).

However, through them, I’ve understood how to write with maximum ease, and enjoyment. 

This morning I did one of them. I went jogging. Surprised by the sudden chill of autumn, and lit by autumn’s soft light, I made it up to the ruined Cathar castle, and looked out over the Pyrenean mountains. Layered one in front of the other, the furthest silhouettes were still tipped by snow, recording last winter. The jagged sides of the nearest were carpeted with trees, their leaves just on the turn towards the completion of the seasons.  

On the winding track down, I met an older woman, in shades and slippers (really). She was struggling to keep up with her Cocker Spaniel.  She caught her breath and exhaled her question. ‘Did you go right up to the top?’ I nodded. Looking exhausted at the very thought, she replied, ‘my husband says I should do that. But it’s such an effort, isn’t it?’ I assumed the most sympathetic face that I could muster whilst jogging on the spot, and with a bon journee, we both went on our way.

But the thing is, it isn’t an effort. Not at all.

Firstly I don’t consider myself a ‘jogger’. It’s just that sometimes I put on trainers, and loosen my body up a bit by moving it on down the road.

I start very slowly. I go absolutely with the level of energy that is present for me that day. I ease into that, whether it’s a fast pace, or a slow pace. I stay with my bodily experience, and don’t aim to go any particular distance, or move at any particular speed. I watch the change of energy. Usually, the act of moving releases more, so I naturally speed up. But sometimes it doesn’t, so I don’t. Sometimes I feel I could push just a tad further into that store of energy. I do that, and watch what happens.

I see that thinking speeds me up. If I get lost in trains of thought, and lose connection with my body, I find that I am racing, disconnected from my physical experience of flow. Effort and resistance move in, and it’s no longer enjoyable. I am duller in body and mind, rather than more alive. 

If I jog in the right way, I arrive back on my doorstep invigorated. If I don’t, I’m exhausted.

The same is true of dancing. It’s about feeling the rhythm of the music, and allowing my body to respond. Not expecting.  Not hoping or fearing. Just waiting patiently for the responses, the messages, and answering.

I’ve taken these principles and applied them to my writing process:

1. I am someone who writes, rather than ‘a writer’ per se.

2. I never count words. Instead I put myself in my writing environment for a certain length of time, stay there whatever, and see what emerges.

3. I move my hand on the pen, or fingers on the keyboard, in response to the energy that arises. Sometimes I edge into it a little. Sometimes, I stop myself from moving away from a task, kindly. But my golden rule is never to force anything. (That risks plots, characters and phrasing being born as lifeless as forced flowers).

4. I have an outline of the section of story I’m going to write next beside me as a signpost, but otherwise I set up as few expectations for myself as possible. I do not berate myself for what my body/mind cannot do on any given day.  It’s my whole self that has a need to tell the story. I have to allow that to be what it wants to be. That’s the whole point of being someone who writes.

This is how I’ve learnt to write in a way that sustains through the months and years of long projects. This body-based learning has done more for me than any techniques offered to my rational mind. 

The Monthly Prompt

What small, physical activities do you do, without effort? E.g. are you an expert chef, lover, cyclist, make-up artist, singer or swimmer?

How could you apply what you know in other body-based arenas to your writing? 

A Writer's Process: Teresa Benison

My first thought when asked to write something for Wild Words was, what about a piece on The Writers’ Day?

Except, this writer’s day isn’t terribly interesting: desk; caffeine; fuss the cats; admire the collared doves roosting in my tree; lunch, then the same thing all over again….

Ok, so what about some musings on the process of writing?

A long time ago someone told me ‘you can’t call yourself a writer until someone else calls you a writer…’ It was seductive and, being young, it made a sort of sense. I see this now for what it truly is, a deeply damaging statement.

I do believe in the importance of connecting with those ‘someone elses’ (readers) but ‘being a writer’ is more than that. It is not what I do, it is what I am.

Story runs deep for me, it always has, and it is everywhere.

Once, walking through Cambridge city centre, I saw a sign on a lamppost advertising, ‘Public Executions’. In a flash my brain was off, transporting me to a dystopian future where executions habitually take place outside John Lewis with the BBC in attendance to capture reactions from the family and friends of victims.

It took me longer to write that paragraph than to envision it. There was a split second between seeing the sign and realising I’d misread it, that it actually said ‘public exhibition’, but that was more than enough time for my brain to go into overdrive. Moreover, for me the reality was far less interesting than my imagining.

So what I would like to do here is celebrate the fact that these days I embrace such moments. They are the flipside to the nag of self-doubt that I’m sure is common to many writers.

I have learnt to trust myself and my process. I never cease to relish the wildness of words and the power of story.

Story bubbles in my brain like a slow-cooking pot; add to that the special alchemy when story is transformed into words, words which take on a life of their own in the mind of the reader… what could be better, more exciting than that?

There you have it: a fragment of this particular writer’s process. Thank you for reading to the end, but now it really is time to get back to the cats and the caffeine, for I sense another story brewing…

Teresa Benison is a writer living and working in Cornwall; visit her at www.teresabenison.com

Inspired By Nature: Sue Johnson

My work and the natural world are closely linked. I am fortunate to have lexical-gustatory synaesthesia where I interpret some words and names as a specific taste.

For instance, ‘world’ tastes of pink blancmange, ‘feather’ tastes of whipped cream and ‘thunder’ tastes of thick porridge. These sensations never change and can’t be switched off!

Since 1st January 2013, I’ve written a poem a day every day. I discovered that, even on days when time was a problem, I could always find a few minutes to scribble the draft of a poem in my notebook – usually sitting in a car park and watching the clouds or focusing on a bird or a tree. Some of these poems have gone on to be published in small press magazines – often with minimal alteration. Others have been developed into longer poems or they’ve formed the nucleus of a short story or a scene from a novel.

A friend of mine keeps a nature journal which includes photographs, pressed flowers, sketches, feathers, leaves and short poems. It occurs to me that this would be a brilliant idea for developing a series of story boards for a short story collection.

Obviously, not all my poems ‘work.’ This doesn’t matter. I have great fun recycling them.

If you fancy trying this, it involves scissors and glue and you can create more than one version. Print off a copy of a poem that hasn’t worked. Cut it up. Add six new words, a colour and a sound. Reposition the words. Play around with them until you’ve got something you’re happy with then glue them in place.

At the end of his life, the artist Picasso said he regretted not playing more. I’m determined not to let this happen to me.

If I do get stuck with a writing project I find that a walk amongst trees or by water helps me to sort the problem.  I’m also lucky to have a summerhouse in the garden where I hear blackbirds on the roof and the scent of lavender and honeysuckle drifts in through the open door.

Nature is playful. Look at the way the clouds move. Look at the common names for wild flowers – what could you do with ‘enchanter’s nightshade’, ‘fox and cubs’ and lady’s smocks?

Listen to the sound of the wind and the different birdsongs.

For a long time now, I’ve looked on the words I create as being like a seed bank. They will yield a harvest when the time is right.  

www.writers-toolkit.co.uk

A Day In The Life Of A Writer: Elizabeth Ducie

When people ask me if I’m retired, I am indignant. True, I will never see 60 again, unless I take my mother-in-law’s example and start counting the years backwards.

True, I no longer have a day job that pays the bills. True, I have thrown out most of my business suits and spend my days in jeans or shorts. But I still work, I protest: I am a full-time writer!

But what does that mean? Do I work a 9-5 shift, five days a week? Do I have someone managing my time and giving me instructions? Let’s think about that.

Even without a regular alarm clock, I get up very early; usually before six o’clock. If it’s a gym day, I head to the nearest town, punish my body for a while and then return for breakfast. Otherwise I hit the laptop as soon as I am up. But either way, I am working well before many employed people.

And in the mornings, I write. Whether it’s a chapter or two of the next novel, a short story for a competition, an article or blog post, I try to get some new words down on (virtual) paper every day.

It’s the quantity of words that I use as my main measure of productivity. (In my earlier life, I was a production manager and it’s hard to drop the terminology.)

As a self-published (by choice) author, I am also responsible for marketing and sales, so there’s lots of administration and promotion to be fitted into the day. That’s my afternoon task; less creative but equally satisfying.

I knock off about tea-time in order to catch up with the early evening quizzes (my guilty secret) but will always have the laptop set up on the table in the lounge. I often return to it during the evening, although it will mainly be for lighter work, like catching up on social media (and yes, that’s work too).

With a life-style like this, weekends mean very little and so this would tend to be my timetable, whatever day the calendar is showing.

So it’s fair to say I work more than a 9-5 shift, seven days a week. But I am my own boss and I manage my own time. If I want to take a couple of hours off for coffee with a friend, or go to the hairdressers mid-week, I do.

No, I’m not retired; I am a full-time writer; and I have the best job in the world.

www.elizabethducie.co.uk

A Writer's Process: Michael Loveday

I’d like to explore here how we, as writers, might recover when faced with a creative trough.

It involves a confession – about three years ago writing and I had fallen out of love.  

What had begun as an adventure, one that easily seduced me, had now dissipated into a series of irritable, familiar and tiresome habits. I was disenchanted with a writing process that I didn’t relish, and disenchanted with my end-product. In short, I was thinking of giving up. The challenges and highs of completing an MA and my first poetry pamphlet in the same summer had left me, afterwards, wandering in something like a desert sprawling with tumbleweed. I could almost hear the wind blowing past my ears. Is that it? What do I do now? Where the hell is everybody?

What follows is an outline of the remedies I sought. They may not all work for others; but perhaps some ideas will connect if you’re ever going through an uncreative time.

(1)   I loathed the results when I put pen to paper. A voice kept telling me I wasn’t creative enough. The writing I admired most, I realised, was associated with a quality of playfulness – one that I now seemed to lack. Michael Atavar has said: “We have this idea that creativity must be a product – a book, a performance, an event. I believe that creativity is a process. It might result in some of these external things, but its main purpose is to develop an attitude within ourselves.” I decided I wanted to make my process as slow, meandering, playful, fertile as possible – as if I were fermenting some fine wine to sip in the future.  (Later, I encountered the poet Liz Berry’s description of her writing process. I drew huge inspiration from this rich, leisurely experimentation).  https://poetryschool.com/poems/sow/.

(2)   I realised that I associated pure creativity most strongly with the visual arts. Look at kids! – they’re painting before they write. I admire artists for doodling away in notebooks, making preparatory sketches. So I bought an A4 artist’s sketchbook for my drafting – cream paper, unlined. I turned the page to landscape, starting in the centre (forgetting about order and position), and filled the page outwards with my pen. I felt much closer to my creative self. 

The drafting process.

(3)   I reminded myself that other writers readily confessed to writing awful stuff. Ann Lamott labels it “the shitty first draft.” https://wrd.as.uky.edu/sites/default/files/1-Shitty%20First%20Drafts.pdf

Raymond Carver talked about how his first drafts “are dreadful”; how he regularly went through between 10 and 30 drafts to get a piece of writing right. 

http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/3059/the-art-of-fiction-no-76-raymond-carver

I became increasingly fascinated with the way it was possible, through patient drafting, to turn base metal into… if not gold, then at least something more interesting than base metal.

More than ever before, most of the words I wrote were “wasted” – edited out; revised to the point that they were no longer the same; or seemed so embarrassing that they were hidden in a drawer. I followed a new 80/20 rule: the last 20% of a piece of writing, I told myself, takes up 80% of the time.

These three seemed to offer a key. In addition -

(4)   I hunted back through several years’ worth of old, abandoned drafts and experiments from my first few years of writing – I’d been industrious when I first started, burning with enthusiasm, before I realised how awful I was, but I’d kept all my old drafts. I sifted for places where the writing had a touch of sparkle. I didn’t find as much as I’d hoped. But I did surprise myself to see this other person, buzzing with ideas, accumulating reams of material. Had I really, once, been producing so much stuff?

I remembered the deal Julia Cameron urges us to make – Universe, look after the quality; I’ll look after the quantity.

(5)   I started using my iPhone to jot down poem / story concepts the moment they sparked, whether memories of my own life, or fiction ideas. Barely a sentence, or a couple of words each time – without saying “oh, I’ll remember that later”. Gradually the list accumulated until I had a large resource of prompts I could go to when it was writing time – just pick the one I fancied most that day, and go.

(6)   In a topsy-turvy experiment, I started using a computer for editing, instead of my beloved pen. I found I was tougher when I typed things in presentable black and white, and this seemed to push my writing to its benefit (though with drafting, I still rely on pen and A4 sketchbook, where I want access to first thoughts, as free as possible from the inner critic).

(7)   I held my nerve more and shoved first drafts “in a drawer” for longer before tinkering. Maybe not quite the mythical month that some writers argue first drafts should be set aside for. But a couple of weeks, at least. Just to see things genuinely fresh.

(8)   And I started a writing journal. A third one, in fact – to my shame, I am a serial journaller, already possessing a traditional diary (where I wrote twice a week), and a reflective learning journal for teaching (once a week). I nattered in my writing journal whenever it suited me. I babbled about: process; how I felt about edits I’d made; potential new edits to try;  sequencing and structuring of material for fantasised poem / story collections; news of rejections (boo! hiss!) or acceptances (hooray!); books I’d been reading, plays and films I’d seen; creativity generally; quotes from books that I admired. Etc, etc. Anything that nourished and consoled the process.

That uncreative tumbleweed: it’ll haunt you if you let it.

There is a long list of other things one can try (and many I’ve stuck with) to escape from it – walking, jogging, meditating, eating better food, going to see films, spending more time with other writers, time with loved ones doing anything but writing, experimenting with a drastic new haircut, smashing your fists against rocks (er – hang on – maybe forget about those last two).

In the end I have, I think, settled in a better place in terms of process: I’ve decided that being a writer demands a mingling of doubt and faith that is disconcerting to experience, but one that I can live with for now.

If you don’t doubt your work, don’t interrogate your themes and narratives, worry about your sentences, you may never push your writing enough until it is ready to share publically (if that’s what you want to do – admittedly a big if).

If you don’t have long-term faith in what you are trying to achieve, you will falter at hurdles – when obstacles materialise in the writing, or when rejections appear, or when low confidence risks leading you into the desert.

Maybe, in fact, negotiating the intersection of these two opposing forces – doubt and faith – is the mission of the writer.

In other words, if you spend enough time thinking “it’s not good enough”, it has a chance of becoming “good enough”. It’s the kind of logical and existential paradox that will trigger cycles of crisis and recovery. (May all artists and writers be creatively fruitful in the land of their suffering! Ha!) But the reality is more mundane: one step at a time, what if I cut this word here, or change that one, or add this one? Would it read more strangely, more beautifully, more powerfully? Can I at least have some fun trying?

 www.michaelloveday.co.uk

A Writer's Process: Sue Shooter

Writing my first novel has been like journeying to destination unknown without a route map. I was crazy to set off in the first place then things became even crazier.

Downloading ideas is the easy bit, just letting them flow. I use good old-fashioned pencil and notebook. That’s how I learnt to write as a child. It’s how my head pours out its garbled contents onto paper. My scrawl is messy and no one would want to read my graphite-scribbled confusion, but my next step is to type up the sentences one by one, arranging them into some kind of order, assist the words in making their sense.

Then I edit. Then I edit. And then I edit some more.

When I’m shaping each subsequent draft I surround the creative process with various repetitive activities. I knit, ferociously. My family have accepted, without complaining, manifold garments from me over the last three years since I started writing fiction. It’s good to know how much they love me!

I also do Killer Sudokus. After making the transition from academic writing to creative writing these puzzles keep my left brain fed, watered and relatively contented. And I swim lots of laps in the local pool or walk miles on the coast path which helps clear my mind. This also has the welcome side effect of keeping me fit when my bum has to spend countless hours on the seat in front of my laptop, or when I have to stare out to sea for a long time, story-dreaming.

These activities help me into an uncontrollable ‘zone’ which is a state where I feel suspended between sheer panic I’ll fail to narrate the story as it should be told, and sheer excitement that something is emerging.

When the key to a scene or a character rises to the surface, when the story solidifies in my head like butter coming together in a churn, I know my supporting activities (aka my OCD behaviours) are working. It feels like magic is happening.

It’s possible to conclude from this description of my writing process that I am clinically insane. Who cares? I’m doing what I love, although the anxiety of whether my book will be published sends me reaching for my knitting needles…

Your Wild Words: Helen Ellwood

For many years, I was plot bound, held in check by the beginning, the middle and the end - kept behind the bars of good-girl grammar and spelling.

I insisted on knowing what was going to happen and frequently forced my characters to obey. They had no freedom to express themselves, to turn right instead of left, to explore the dangerous jungle trail to the unknown.

I always thought it was weakness when people said that their characters wrote the story, but now that I have two teenagers learning about love and a tropical island intent on their death, I’ve change my mind.

Even I, the god of this particular little world, can’t tell these youngsters what to do or say. I have learned to listen.

I can now feel the wild heartbeat as they kiss for the first time.

I hear the knock, knock as the bones of a long dead soldier roll against the coral. Fear tightens my belly as the island plans their doom.

Wild writing is not safe. It is liberating.