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reenkawah. i'm in (fucking) love. my comparative lit professor uses words like "fuck" and "shit" so -seriously-, except -not-, and he's this old white guy, and it's just hilarious. i mean... hearing someone say "fucking" in a really proper sort of tone is just priceless. (and also, casually, about some french philosopher-writer: "he was a fag, by the way" and i just -died-. er. i don't -think- he meant it offensively. i mean. you just had to hear it. priceless.)
but anyway.
he said something that really made me think. "You begin to write when you start to stammer and you don't know what to say." my last fic came pretty easily to me. it was just fluff, just complete randomness and "pushing ideas around" and not really Saying Something about harry/draco or Their Great and Tooby Love or what have you. i was just writing it hoping it would please and amuse. and yet, i came to the point, near the end, where i wasn't sure what to do. i was -really- tired and almost falling asleep, and i was really almost panicking because i -had- to finish, but i didn't have any more tricks up my sleeve at that point, and i didn't know what was going to happen.
this happens to me a lot in stories. i'm coasting along, happy as a clam, scribbling and scribbling and then scribbling some more, having snark and sex and magic and so on, and then i hit a wall. and at that point, the inspiration hides behind a cloud or something, and i just don't -know-. it's like i'm the reader, not the writer anymore, and i was never very good (as a reader) at figuring out plot-points. which is to say, i suck very horribly at it.
i consider that point to be the Deflation Point. i'm very disappointed in myself, and i feel scared that this means i won't finish (which is the bane of my existence in terms of writing), and i feel like, this is it. i may return to it in two months or two years or more likely, it's dead. i mean, i just can't -write- if i've written myself into a corner. something needs to -happen- and i tend to have no clue -what-.
the idea that this is when i should really get in gear and start to really write is fascinating to me. imagine if i'm missing out on the best part, when i'd actually be -thinking-, and going where it's -difficult-, where it's slow, where i've never been before. that's when i have to put out more energy, where i have to really test myself and do things that i don't want to, and see what i can do when i'm no longer relying on easy inspiration.
a lot of writers complain of writer's block, lack of inspiration, and so on. and this is what that is. that feeling of density, of it no longer being -easy-. it's like the muse has left you, and you are alone, basically. alone in your head, with the fic just -staring- and you, and refusing to move. you'd have to push it. and a lot of people say, if you write when you don't -want- to, when it doesn't feel right, it would make for bad fic.
but what if that's not true? what if that's when the real writing happens? when you have to think?
i adore my muse. it's happy easy springtime in my head, when my muse is happy. i don't even notice what i'm doing and it's simple as breathing. i'm just -being-, and it happens that "being" involves writing at that time. that's what it feels like. and then it -stops-, and the thing i wrote is some sort of foreign "object" that i'm outside of, that i'm just -staring- at, and it's pouting and showing me its arse, and i just almost -hate- it.
i kept writing, last night, even though i was mostly asleep and mostly silly (i get really silly when i'm sleepy), and i wasn't really having any ideas, but i wrote anyway. and it was ok, i think. i got ideas, but i -forced- them, and i think they worked anyway. my one detailed review said it even worked -well-. and i was really forcing that.
so maybe. maybe there's something to the idea that this was me stammering, and trying, and -becoming-, along with the fic. maybe there's something to that.
~~
EDIT -
it occurs to me that comparing myself to people who either make me weep with overwhelmed ardor at their writing, or conversely laugh wickedly at their awkwardness isn't the point either. i mean, they either do it for me or they don't, and when they do i want to pretty much bow down in worship, but that's just -me-. those feelings are -mine-, and while the writer inspires them in me, the reading is really a two-way process. the writer needs me too, to truly make that story everything it could be. i always need to keep reminding myself of that. it's so easy to feel swept away, overwhelmed, positively a part of the story so much that i kind of lose myself. but not everyone reacts the same way. a number of people read that same story, and while they appreciate it, they don't weep and rave and feel their insides melt into a liquefied puddle at the glory of it all.
it's hard to remember that it's my imagination too, my feelings that are -there- to be called upon, my sensitivity responding to the inspiration of the prose. even if i'm a sensitive reader, that is something, that is a way to participate in the beauty of the art. it's not merely creating that's vital and beautiful. the responding is also a part of it, that being the only way we even have of -knowing- it's -worked- and the intent has been received. no writing can be brilliant without a certain sort of brilliance in the reader, a certain -openness-, a receptivity.
i despair and angst and wring my hands, thinking i can never touch anyone the way aja touches me with virtually anything she writes, but her ficlets in particular, like today with her MPI ficlet, `still'. i want to make people feel the way her writing makes me feel. i want to attain some sort of communion with language, where it bends to my will entirely. but unless i had the right readers, it won't happen. there's talent of course, which makes it easier, but that's all it does. makes it easier.
and maybe writing is merely -projecting- the same thing you are able to truly perceive and understand on this sublime level. sublime. that's the only word i can use to describe things that touch me. i am a part of it, receiving or projecting. i am either finding a beam of light, someone's words reaching me, or i am beaming out my own flashlight, hoping, hoping. it's not fair to just -compare- myself, and disparage my own writing, because i don't have the -readers- to tell me anything, and it's just myself. i can't really -know-, not really. i can only know the sublimity i find, merely in having written. and i think 99% of the time, that is enough.
but anyway.
he said something that really made me think. "You begin to write when you start to stammer and you don't know what to say." my last fic came pretty easily to me. it was just fluff, just complete randomness and "pushing ideas around" and not really Saying Something about harry/draco or Their Great and Tooby Love or what have you. i was just writing it hoping it would please and amuse. and yet, i came to the point, near the end, where i wasn't sure what to do. i was -really- tired and almost falling asleep, and i was really almost panicking because i -had- to finish, but i didn't have any more tricks up my sleeve at that point, and i didn't know what was going to happen.
this happens to me a lot in stories. i'm coasting along, happy as a clam, scribbling and scribbling and then scribbling some more, having snark and sex and magic and so on, and then i hit a wall. and at that point, the inspiration hides behind a cloud or something, and i just don't -know-. it's like i'm the reader, not the writer anymore, and i was never very good (as a reader) at figuring out plot-points. which is to say, i suck very horribly at it.
i consider that point to be the Deflation Point. i'm very disappointed in myself, and i feel scared that this means i won't finish (which is the bane of my existence in terms of writing), and i feel like, this is it. i may return to it in two months or two years or more likely, it's dead. i mean, i just can't -write- if i've written myself into a corner. something needs to -happen- and i tend to have no clue -what-.
the idea that this is when i should really get in gear and start to really write is fascinating to me. imagine if i'm missing out on the best part, when i'd actually be -thinking-, and going where it's -difficult-, where it's slow, where i've never been before. that's when i have to put out more energy, where i have to really test myself and do things that i don't want to, and see what i can do when i'm no longer relying on easy inspiration.
a lot of writers complain of writer's block, lack of inspiration, and so on. and this is what that is. that feeling of density, of it no longer being -easy-. it's like the muse has left you, and you are alone, basically. alone in your head, with the fic just -staring- and you, and refusing to move. you'd have to push it. and a lot of people say, if you write when you don't -want- to, when it doesn't feel right, it would make for bad fic.
but what if that's not true? what if that's when the real writing happens? when you have to think?
i adore my muse. it's happy easy springtime in my head, when my muse is happy. i don't even notice what i'm doing and it's simple as breathing. i'm just -being-, and it happens that "being" involves writing at that time. that's what it feels like. and then it -stops-, and the thing i wrote is some sort of foreign "object" that i'm outside of, that i'm just -staring- at, and it's pouting and showing me its arse, and i just almost -hate- it.
i kept writing, last night, even though i was mostly asleep and mostly silly (i get really silly when i'm sleepy), and i wasn't really having any ideas, but i wrote anyway. and it was ok, i think. i got ideas, but i -forced- them, and i think they worked anyway. my one detailed review said it even worked -well-. and i was really forcing that.
so maybe. maybe there's something to the idea that this was me stammering, and trying, and -becoming-, along with the fic. maybe there's something to that.
~~
EDIT -
it occurs to me that comparing myself to people who either make me weep with overwhelmed ardor at their writing, or conversely laugh wickedly at their awkwardness isn't the point either. i mean, they either do it for me or they don't, and when they do i want to pretty much bow down in worship, but that's just -me-. those feelings are -mine-, and while the writer inspires them in me, the reading is really a two-way process. the writer needs me too, to truly make that story everything it could be. i always need to keep reminding myself of that. it's so easy to feel swept away, overwhelmed, positively a part of the story so much that i kind of lose myself. but not everyone reacts the same way. a number of people read that same story, and while they appreciate it, they don't weep and rave and feel their insides melt into a liquefied puddle at the glory of it all.
it's hard to remember that it's my imagination too, my feelings that are -there- to be called upon, my sensitivity responding to the inspiration of the prose. even if i'm a sensitive reader, that is something, that is a way to participate in the beauty of the art. it's not merely creating that's vital and beautiful. the responding is also a part of it, that being the only way we even have of -knowing- it's -worked- and the intent has been received. no writing can be brilliant without a certain sort of brilliance in the reader, a certain -openness-, a receptivity.
i despair and angst and wring my hands, thinking i can never touch anyone the way aja touches me with virtually anything she writes, but her ficlets in particular, like today with her MPI ficlet, `still'. i want to make people feel the way her writing makes me feel. i want to attain some sort of communion with language, where it bends to my will entirely. but unless i had the right readers, it won't happen. there's talent of course, which makes it easier, but that's all it does. makes it easier.
and maybe writing is merely -projecting- the same thing you are able to truly perceive and understand on this sublime level. sublime. that's the only word i can use to describe things that touch me. i am a part of it, receiving or projecting. i am either finding a beam of light, someone's words reaching me, or i am beaming out my own flashlight, hoping, hoping. it's not fair to just -compare- myself, and disparage my own writing, because i don't have the -readers- to tell me anything, and it's just myself. i can't really -know-, not really. i can only know the sublimity i find, merely in having written. and i think 99% of the time, that is enough.
