Inspiration

[SamScribble]

I was listening to a panel discussion on the radio last night. Three painters, all women, were discussing their working methods. The woman chairing the discussion asked something about inspiration. One of the painters said: ‘Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just turn up for work each morning and get on with it.’ That’s pretty much how I feel about writing.

 

[TheRedChamber]

It probably makes sense from a professional point of view. As a teacher, sometimes I'm inspired to do a particularly novel activity in class or inspired to explain something use a particular real world example I stumble upon, but even when I'm not inspired, I still need to plan a 'normal' lesson in due time and can still make that normal lesson meet a high standard (possibly more so than my crazier inspired ideas where I haven't necessarily ironed out all the kinks). It's probably not a great idea of a painter to lie around in bed all day going 'I'm just not particularly inspired today'.

The other thing is, I've written 15 stories in the past 6 months. During that same time, I've also opened a file which currently contains 60 other possible story ideas (or 'plot bunnies' to use the board's preferred term). These ideas are generally more developed than just 'sex, but in...a bakery!' - in some cases they're more or less a complete story that just I haven't written yet, often they're one scene that appeals to me, and seems like it could go somewhere but I'm not sure where yet. Some of the ideas are half-baked and some of them no doubt are crap.

The real trick with inspiration is to try and keep it focused on the same story and that's easier if you're currently actually writing it.

 

[KeithD]

I was listening to a panel discussion on the radio last night. Three painters, all women, were discussing their working methods. The woman chairing the discussion asked something about inspiration. One of the painters said: ‘Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just turn up for work each morning and get on with it.’ That’s pretty much how I feel about writing.

It's still driven by inspiration. The experienced have just developed to be able to recognize and use inspiration quickly and without fuss.

 

[EarlyMorningLight]

I draw a great deal from my own experiences, and from people I’ve known.

I also draw inspiration from other writers, not in terms of their stories and style, but in the emotional impact of their work. Several of my WIPs started with me reading a story on Lit ad saying “if I wanted to get the same investment from readers that writer X did with story Y, how would I do it?” With these ones I generally start building mental sketches of characters first. Once I know the characters, they usually start to tell me their stories.

Also, and this will come as no surprise to people who are familiar with my work, I draw a lot of inspiration from music.

 

[JGittes]

I was listening to a panel discussion on the radio last night. Three painters, all women, were discussing their working methods. The woman chairing the discussion asked something about inspiration. One of the painters said: ‘Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just turn up for work each morning and get on with it.’ That’s pretty much how I feel about writing.

This is pretty much what Roger Ebert told aspiring writers. The muse strikes only when you're sitting in your chair at your desk, typing away.

 

[KeithD]

My muse usually strikes when I'm in a semiconscious stage between sleeping and waking up in the morning.

 

[ElectricBlue]

This is pretty much what Roger Ebert told aspiring writers. The muse strikes only when you're sitting in your chair at your desk, typing away.

Funny, I don't ever recall typing anything in a café, or on a bus, or in the street, or climbing a mountain, or walking a rain swept hill. So I'm going to say bollocks to Roger on that one.

What would he know anyway? That's critics for ya!

 

[SimonDoom]

My muse usually strikes when I'm in a semiconscious stage between sleeping and waking up in the morning.

I've had that happen a few times, but not often. It's a cool feeling--when you feel bound to jump out of bed and start getting the story into words.

 

[MrPixel]

One of the painters said: ‘Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just turn up for work each morning and get on with it.’

Art without inspiration looks like it.

 

[HeyAll]

I'm the opposite.

I always keep my eyes and mind open for inspiration: news articles, articles of people's experiences, movie scenes, erotic photographs. I look everywhere for something that could give me an idea for a new story.

 

[SamScribble]

It's still driven by inspiration. The experienced have just developed to be able to recognize and use inspiration quickly and without fuss.

You may be right. I think what the woman was saying was that, if you're 'an amateur', you can probably afford to wait for inspiration to come to you. If you are a pro, if it is your job to be creative, you trust that inspiration will be there when you need it.

 

[Carnevil9]

Funny, I don't ever recall typing anything in a café, or on a bus, or in the street, or climbing a mountain, or walking a rain swept hill. So I'm going to say bollocks to Roger on that one.

What would he know anyway? That's critics for ya!

It's true that Ebert is mostly known as a critic. But he was also a writer of original material. IMDb lists him with nine writing credits, including a full screenplay for Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.

 

[longboy2022]

I was listening to a panel discussion on the radio last night. Three painters, all women, were discussing their working methods. The woman chairing the discussion asked something about inspiration. One of the painters said: ‘Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just turn up for work each morning and get on with it.’ That’s pretty much how I feel about writing.

What then is this process of getting on with it if not inspiration. Do you put on a random words machine and write a story around the first 100 words that come up, or the first 10 things you see in the mall? Other than such mechanical processes, what out inspires inspiration?

 

[ElectricBlue]

It's true that Ebert is mostly known as a critic. But he was also a writer of original material. IMDb lists him with nine writing credits, including a full screenplay for Beyond the Valley of the Dolls.

Not necessarily the best recommendation .

 

[Carnevil9]

Not necessarily the best recommendation .

Okay, so now YOU are a critic but not an author?

My point being, that you can be both.

ETA: not only CAN you be both, but you could make an argument that you HAVE TO be both, to be credible as either.

 

[EarlyMorningLight]

Okay, so now YOU are a critic but not an author?

My point being, that you can be both.

I've been on both sides of the divide. Worked for years as a critic even while I was producing creative output. There have been a ton of bad/lazy critics, and it only gets worse as the profession becomes de-professionalized, but I'd put the work of the great ones up against any artist.

 

[SamScribble]

What then is this process of getting on with it if not inspiration. Do you put on a random words machine and write a story around the first 100 words that come up, or the first 10 things you see in the mall? Other than such mechanical processes, what out inspires inspiration?

Sorry, I don't understand your question.

 

[JGittes]

At least two separate issues are being discussed; inspiration and writing.

Inspiration is easy. Right now, I'm sitting in my front window on a High Street in a picturesque English village on the first pleasantly warm day of what portends to be two weeks of beautiful summer weather. Since I started typing, at least sixty people have walked by on their way to shops across the street or beside my house. At least half are women who seem to have mistakenly dressed as if this were a women-only day spa. Smack in the middle of the most conservative part of England, hundreds of people will walk by my window, inspiring hundreds of stories.

There are, of course, those rare times when I'm 'inspired' to write 6k words that flow like water over Victoria Falls onto the page when I've awoken from a spectacular dream with lunch being the only interruption before I fall exhausted into bed that night with a beautiful, Kerouacian manuscript roll ready to send to the publisher. Usually, though, the next day's sober reading reveals a vomitous mess requiring days of editing to make coherent sense.

Consistently wrestling 'inspiration' into a well-written story (to whatever degree of well-written you desire) is an entirely different matter. This is what the painters and Roger Ebert are talking about. There are rare geniuses who have the ability to produce wonderfully written stories from an early age. I don't think there are any of them here. For the rest of us, it's years of hard work that will eventually become habit for the professional. The rest of us remain amateurs.

 

[Carnevil9]

I'm surprised nobody has brought up the famous Thomas Edison quote: "Genius is one percent inspiration, and ninety-nine percent perspiration."

 

[SimonDoom]

I'm somewhere in the middle on this question, but I think my view of it applies only to me, and I wouldn't presume to apply it to anyone else. However your personal muse works, listen to her, and forget the chatter of others.

I'm an extremely undisciplined writer, and inspiration comes to me in all kinds of unpredictable ways. When it does, I'll drop what I'm doing and try to write.

But I also think (for me) there's something to the idea of just sitting one's ass in the chair and forcing oneself to write. That works for me, too, when I do it.

I think it takes a combination: receptiveness to spontaneous inspiration, and discipline. But your formula may be different.

 

[MillieDynamite]

Uninspired writing becomes the latest James Patterson best seller. The junk is produced by cowriters laboring for wages as credited ghostwriters. Mostly, popular fast food, produced for the reader, like so many burgers and fries. While many writers churn out crap to satisfy deadlines and expectations, I prefer the writers who write inspired tales, if less often, still more satisfying than mass-produced frozen fair to read because it's X, Y, or Z's latest and greatest bullshit opus.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

If this were work, I wouldn't be doing it.

I'm very much an amateur and my inspiration usually comes from dreams.

Sometimes a story starts as a movie playing in my head that gets triggered by a song, a piece of artwork, or a random thought, and I can't get it to stop until I write it down.

I think we have the same thought process when it comes to writing. So often I can't sleep because a story is playing out in my head. Sometimes I'll get up and get it down before I lose it, or I know I'll struggle to remember where my thoughts were going in the morning. I don't think of writing as work, or I don't think I'd enjoy it as much. Although, when I have a deadline for a contest, I will push myself to get it done.

 

[ScrappyPaperDoodler]

I think a lot of people wait for 'inspiration' whether it’s creative or to do with something like their career. Hell, lots of people require a religious or spiritual signal/symbol of some type before making any major life decisions.

That’s fine, and some people do genuinely get struck by eureka moments, but I do think there’s a lot to be said for framing inspiration as the culmination of an ongoing process and creativity as something that can be exercised and driven by mindfulness/thoughtfulness.

 

[MillieDynamite]

In my personal writing, I write with and from inspiration. I write from their outlines in my ghost-work and do what I can with the formula.

 

[Bubo_bubo]

Inspiration is the spark, talent is the kindling and hard work is the firewood.