Better Writing Through Chemistry?

[Guest]

I know that the question of chemically inspired writing has been brought up before, but I am too lazy to dig out the thread.

I had oral surgery today and for the first time experienced Nitrous Oxide. Great stuff!

As I was stretched out in the chair with various torture devices being plied on my mouth (sounds like a plot already, doesn't it) a story that I started last summer came to mind and the plot pieced itself together for me.

It is a story that has plagued me since its inception, and now I think I have a good handle on how it is going to work.. including character development, significant events, conflicts and resolutions.

I am outlining everything now and will wait until the pain meds are no longer necessary to do the actual writing.

Question: How many of you have had similar experiences due to chemical influences (alcohol et al)?

and

Were you happy with the results? How did they compare to non-chemically influenced writing?

b

 

[Quasimodem]

One night I came home in the early hours of the morning carrying a heavy load of the past eight-hour worth of imbibed chemical pixilation.

Spying my still unfinished masterpiece, I experienced epiphany! I knew just what to do, to turn the piece of drek I was writing, into The Great Canadian Novel!

Unfortunately, I was too far into the bottle to leave legible instructions. Even encumbered by my less than agile brain, I recognized that impediment. Instead, I told my idea to a tape recorder.

Three days later, when my head bone quit throbbing in sympathy to the thunderous sound of a fly stamping his feet on the ceiling, I dug out that tape recorder, and played it back.

I played it several times, and could never understand a word.

It was on that day that I vowed, never again, to try out-drinking my cousin.

 

[MathGirl]

I once wrote a story under the influence of Wente Bros Gray Riesling. The next day, it looked like someone who was drunk tried to write. I guess I'm not the 'opium eater' kind of writer.
MG

 

[Rainbow Skin]

Much as I love alcohol, and bib it incessantly, even the smallest amount shuts off that crucial brain function that makes delicate, balletic connexions between ideas. Great writers might drink because of what they do, but not while they're doing it.

But there's a certain chemical dissociation that means, on a lazy summer afternoon, or as you're just recovering from a long sleep or booze, or if you've taken an awful lot of painkillers... the usual rational control of sequence cuts out, and you get flips from one idea to the next. Not really dreamlike, not with the indifferent chaos of dreams. If you get an idea in a dream and try to apply it in waking, it often turns into a pile of incoherent shit. The ideas that come when the topmost level of rational control are just slightly knocked out, however, stay there, afterwards, as visions of how things might be in a better world.

Well, mine do; occasionally.

 

[Alex756]

OK I feel like I'm at a 12 step program

Many of my best ideas come in either a sleep deprived state (thats kinda chemical) or under the influance of tylanol PM.

Occasionally if I can't sleep say from allergies sinuses whatnot I take tylanol PM, most times its off to peaceful slumber land. Sometimes though, very rarely, it doens't do what its suposed to and I end up in this weird nightmare/panic state. You know your body is being restrained and your mind is doing mach 7. It is then that my best ideas for horror stories happen. Only when I am scared to the point of cold sweats and abject terror do the scariest ideas coccure to me. And I never have to write them down. I remeber each and everyone in total detail.

Other than that I don't really do any chemical stuff so no experience with anything else.

 

[Sabledrake]

One of the wildest, sauciest fanfics I ever wrote was a Gargoyles story called "Love Machine," about the bachelor and bachelorette parties for two of the canon characters. I had just had my tonsils out (better late than never) and was on some sort of liquid codeine cough syrup at the time

Sabledrake

 

[OT]

the trick is to write under the influence, but edit in the (sober) light of day.

I sometimes find that a bourbon or two gets the muse in the mood (she can be an inhibited B...)

 

[jfinn]

I can barely write sober, there's no way I could if I wasn't.

Jayne

 

[Just-Legal]

While stoned.

Produces brilliant work, or "wtf was I on when I wrote this?"

Druggedly,

 

[TheEarl]

While running on adrenalin after being awake at 2.00AM.

Works for me anyway.

The Earl

 

[Gabriel_Lee]

I must say, under the influence, I have penned some pretty magnificent stuff. It is a shame that, afterwards, hampered by mundane sobriety, I seem completely unable to recognize the brilliance that I know possessed me at the time.

GL

BTW. Alcohol also seems to be able to shrink my vocabulary, sometimes alarmingly.

 

[snooper]

Reality

I too find that reality is an unpleasant state of mind induced by acute alcohol deprivation.

 

[karmadog]

Actually, I've found a few truly poetic turns of phrase while buzzed to the gills. I've even found a plot or two while perhaps more than toasty.

Stoned? Nothing. But then I haven't toked in years. Got nothing against it, but I reached a point where I couldn't get high (does anyone else remember that song by The Fugs?)

Still, I think one must be careful about accepting as genius what they do when they're chemically altered.

 

[Guest]

different connectedness

Thank you all for your candor.

I think that Rainbow and Alex brought up what I am thinking about. In a technical way while "under some influence" I doubt that anything I wrote would be brilliant, I do think some "brainstorming" or drifting may be helped along.

It is more the aspect of allowing different connections to flow- either because I am disconnected from most of what is going on around me or because the "normal" pathways of my brain have been freed up.

I still like the plot that revealed itself to me yesterday. Now if my jaw would stop aching so I could get off the narcotics, I could start writing.

 

[Chicklet]

I don't write stoned, I don't write drunk, I don't write under the influence of anything the Doctor gives me. But, I *do* write under the influence of a LOT of caffeine.

In my experience, my best writing happens when I am super hyper. My fingers move faster than my brain, and at times I don't even know exactly what I'm writing, but it flows, it sounds good, and then it is very popular online.

WHOOOHOOO!! CAFFEINE!!!

 

[sirhugs]

the trick is to write under the influence, but edit in the (sober) light of day.

I sometimes find that a bourbon or two gets the muse in the mood (she can be an inhibited B...)

ditto
although red wine or summer coolers work too....

 

[gauchecritic]

How many kids have you got Bikini? And this was your first time with Entenox? Have you never been transported to hospital in pain in an ambulance? What kind of health service have you got over there?

(You are NOT under arrest and there is no obligation to answer any of those questions which may or may not be used against you in a court of law (kangaroos not withstanding).)

From when I was helping an ambulance driver learn about how to man an ambulance (reading from her work book, not from any experience) I found out that Entenox (NO2), at that time was the safest and least damaging way to self administer a pain suppressor. At will and as required.

Any way. Not having encountered any perception altering substances, other than cigs and alchohol. I find that life is the stimulant/depressant of choice for me.

Ok. Alright. It's a joke ?

Apparently Kieth Richards of The Stones whilst under the influence of various kinds sat in his arm chair, turned on the tape machine, picked up his guitar and fell immediately into a deep sleep. When he eventually woke again the next day (days later?), on reviewing the tape he found an hour's worth of silence except the very first few seconds which contained the opening bar of "Brown Sugar".

Gauche

 

[sirhugs]

< foribve the edit, chicklet>
WHOOOHOOO!! CAFFEINE!!!

wanted to doubly second this Emotion:

WHOOOHOOO!! CAFFEINE!!!

WHOOOHOOO!! CAFFEINE!!!

 

[TheEarl]

Still, I think one must be careful about accepting as genius what they do when they're chemically altered.

I'll always remember the story (which has been told on this board before, so apologies to whoever I'm stealing it off) about the first research into the effects of LSD. In one of the laboratory trials one of the researchers announced that she had discovered the secret of life and knew the answer to the ultimate question (not 42). She wrote it down on a piece of paper, sealed it in an envelope and put it to one side.

When everyone had got back to normal, they opened the envelope to discover that she'd written 'If I stand on my toes I can touch the ceiling.'

Genius is relative.

The Earl

 

[Guest]

Genius is relative.

Not really, dear. It is a much ill used appellation.

If as so many persons can agree that Shakespeare, Mozart or Beethoven were geniuses, then how on earth can one apply the term to Stephen Spielberg, Jim Morrison or the guy who invented Star Trek.

Just a quibble.

Pear

 

[gauchecritic]

'If I stand on my toes I can touch the ceiling.'
The Earl

sounds like a lifestyle choice to me.

Gauche

 

[BlackSnake]

...

Gauche

Hey, I thought you might like this

 

[Quasimodem]

. . . 'If I stand on my toes I can touch the ceiling.' . .

As opposed to: "If I stand on my head I can toe the ceiling?"

 

[TheEarl]

Not really, dear. It is a much ill used appellation.

If as so many persons can agree that Shakespeare, Mozart or Beethoven were geniuses, then how on earth can one apply the term to Stephen Spielberg, Jim Morrison or the guy who invented Star Trek.

Just a quibble.

Pear

I thought I was being original; has someone else said that before me? I have to disagree: Many people will agree that Shakespeare is a genius, but a lot of them will be agreeing, because they know everyone else will be agreeing. I personally think Shakespeare was a superb playwright, but a lot of people can't give you more than 'To be or not to be' and haven't actually read a Shakespeare play. To quote Rimmer: 'I've seen West Side Story, that's based on one of them.'

It's like the argument about the Mona Lisa being the most famous painting in the world. It is the most famous painting because loads of people go and see it. Loads of people go and see it, because it is the most famous painting in the world. Closed circle.

The Earl

 

[Guest]

for The Earl

TE: I was taking your three-word simple sentence too seriously then. Of course individuals or groups of persons can view genius relatively; ergo those who say Jim Morrison or his ilk were so. I must discard your logic re. Shakespeare though; you must know I wasn’t speaking of his popularity and the fact that a RD character might make reference however distanced by the show’s superb wit.

I am not one of those ‘lots of people’. If you read as many of the plays as I have, repeatedly, and talk to others who have, and think deeply about the English language for a good number of years, then you might still simply call him a superb playwright but I will listen to you with due attention and argue somewhat elegantly and with purpose. This does not seem the place for it and does seem an appropriate time to bring up that dread notion re. your youth.

Very cordially, Pear