Fragments of inspiration

[Weird Harold]

I keep getting ideas that could lead to interesting stories but aren't really enough to get the story started.

The latest is a character named Camilla Sutro -- a name that would inevitably lead to the nickname "Kamasutra" and probably some unreasonable expectations about sexuality.

It's fairly easy to build a couple of different character backgrounds for poor Cammie, but it can't seem to put that character into a current situation to tll a story about.

Mostly this is just a way to get the character out of my head, but also a question:

What do you do with the fragments of inspiration that come along without a story to put them in?

 

[impressive]

What do you do with the fragments of inspiration that come along without a story to put them in?

Turn them into poems.

 

[LadyJeanne]

I write the fragments out and keep them in a 'draft bits' file. When I am writing a story, I sometimes scan through the fragments and see if there is anything that I can use or that inspires other ideas.

In the meantime, perhaps this might help to kick start your thinking:

Hollywood Squares

 

[sophia jane]

Turn them into poems.

Yep. Me too.

 

[McKenna]

What do you do with the fragments of inspiration that come along without a story to put them in?

Sometimes I work them into poems, other times I write out what I wanted to write and store them away in folder -I might get back to them, I might not, but at least I have them recorded somewhere.



Maybe Cammie is a student of ancient texts? Meets up with a professor for some hubba hubba hunk of burning love? Have fun with that one, the name is very clever.




Edited Bit: Jumping Jehosaphat you people are fast.

 

[Guest]

What do you do with the fragments of inspiration that come along without a story to put them in?

They are often the seed from which a story grows. Often, it is just a snippet of dialog. I keep them in an idea document on my PC.

I have a story written but not yet posted whose genesis was "If you want me, you can have me, but you have to take me now."

Or a snippet written by Alex De Kok that inspired me to write a story with his permission using it. (Her Great Offer) : "So, beat-off, hand job, blow job, or fuck. It's your choice."

And then there's speech which I wrote, and have yet to integrate into a story from a woman's point of view :

"Just for one night I want to be free of the shackles imparted on me by the lessons my mother, society and female peers have forced on me, and give my feminity and my sexuality free reign to incite a man; to incite him so that he ravages me unabashedly for his own pleasure, unmindful of my needs or even comfort, but in so releasing him, he actually satisfies me in a ways and a totallity no man ever could any other way."

 

[impressive]

I write the fragments out and keep them in a 'draft bits' file. When I am writing a story, I sometimes scan through the fragments and see if there is anything that I can use or that inspires other ideas.

In the meantime, perhaps this might help to kick start your thinking:

Hollywood Squares

http://www.canal96.com/extra/strange/kamasutra/images/15.gif Reminds me of the Ab Roller.

 

[LadyJeanne]

http://www.canal96.com/extra/strange/kamasutra/images/15.gif Reminds me of the Ab Roller.

This is the one that had me in hysterics...and the judges give him an 8.675 for the floor excercise...

http://www.canal96.com/extra/strange/kamasutra/images/17.gif

 

[impressive]

Positions

Oops -- replied instead of new thread. Duh

 

[Guest]

This is the one that had me in hysterics...and the judges give him an 8.675 for the floor excercise...

http://www.canal96.com/extra/strange/kamasutra/images/17.gif

I get dizzy just watching him.

 

[rgraham666]

Write them down in my idea notebook. Look them over occasionally and chew on them in my mind.

My best story came from a painting. Just a woman standing in an orange slip, fingers in the hem as if to pull it up and a tiny wicked smile on her face.

Got 15,000 words out of that one.

 

[Colleen Thomas]

I keep getting ideas that could lead to interesting stories but aren't really enough to get the story started.

The latest is a character named Camilla Sutro -- a name that would inevitably lead to the nickname "Kamasutra" and probably some unreasonable expectations about sexuality.

It's fairly easy to build a couple of different character backgrounds for poor Cammie, but it can't seem to put that character into a current situation to tll a story about.

Mostly this is just a way to get the character out of my head, but also a question:

What do you do with the fragments of inspiration that come along without a story to put them in?

I write up what I have, add any information that is pertinent and drop it into the WIP folder. When inspiration strikes or when a story I am working on has a lace for it, I'll take out the old idea and meld it to the story I am working on.

 

[Penelope Street]

What do you do with the fragments of inspiration that come along without a story to put them in?

I write them at once and store them. I have three such collections; one is story concepts, one scenes, and another just stray lines or brief exchanges of dialogue . I end up using many of the scenes/lines. Rarely do I pick up and finish one of the story concepts, but at least they're out of my head, so to speak.

 

[Quiet_Cool]

No particular process. If they're worth anything, they'll be upstairs floating around on mind clouds until I'm ready for them (or develop Altzheimer's, which may occur sooner than using the ideas, at the rate at which I actually write them down). Those that aren't worth much; well, they disappear, never to be heard from again. Of course, I have remembered a few of them while reading at later times, notably while reading books that probably shouldn't have been written, by authors who probably shouldn't be writing.

Whatever that's worth.

Q_C

 

[oggbashan]

Folders

I write them down and include as much of the story as I can see at the time, if only as bullet points.

I file them in a series of folders as they seem to fit themes.

From time to time I revisit them. They might spark a completed story, or add to a pending story, or generate more ideas that might become stories.

Over a period of two or three years most of them get used some way or other. NaNoWriMo can use two or three folders.

Og

 

[MagicFingers]

Hi, WH

I get inspiring ideas like that sometimes too.
I write them in a StoryIdeas.txt file in my stories folder and think about them, come back and and stuff when new insight arrives, then, sometimes, write a story about it.

One great idea I had similar to yours is only a line: "She had the kind of walk that could sink a thousand ships." Inspired by that guy who had the "Walking Warrior" in his sig line. Remember her? Sometimes I'll see a woman who's walk exudes sensuality and sexuality and I want to include that description in a story about her.

So, save the ideas and something good will happen to them.

 

[Liar]

I say "oh well" and forget them.

Not very productive, I know. But it works for me.

 

[Weird Harold]

I say "oh well" and forget them.

Not very productive, I know. But it works for me.

That's my problem -- the forgetting them part.

I started this thread mostly as a way to "forget" Camilla because just putting her in file as an idea to use later didn't work for me; I have to give ideas like this one away before I can stop tweaking and picking at them all the time. (For the record, if anyone has story that she'll fit into, feel free to use her.)