The Centipede's Dilemma

[rgraham666]

The Centipede's Dilemma is a story about a centipede.

As you know, centipedes have a lot of legs. One day someone asked one how he walked.

He thought about it, and he never walked again. From that point on, every time he walked he thought about it. And walking was too complex an action to be done consciously.

I'm not comfortable posting in writing threads because I fear The Centipede's Dilemma. I'm always worried that if I think too much about the writing process I'll end up not writing. Writing, to my mind, is an unconscious process. If I became too conscious of what I'm doing and is too complex an action to be done consciously.

How about you? Do you fear The Centipede's Dilemma?

 

[ABSTRUSE]

Yes! I have to do it from inside me, naturally or its crap.
I never liked rules or having to think.

 

[rgraham666]

Yes! I have to do it from inside me, naturally or its crap.
I never liked rules or having to think.

I like thinking. I just don't like thinking about thinking.

It has that stench of propriety about it.

 

[ABSTRUSE]

I like thinking. I just don't like thinking about thinking.

It has that stench of propriety about it.

I ponder...its like light thinking but with head tapping.

 

[3113]

How about you? Do you fear The Centipede's Dilemma?

With my arrogance? Ha! I fear nothing! Except that other people (like editors, publishers, etc.) won't recognize my genius

 

[Nirvanadragones]

I have a natural need to analyse, especially for the sake of finding out " why". It's probably the question I ask most in my life - and not only because I have to know to understand - because it helps me find the significance in what I am doing or not doing.

Yet, for me, the issue of how I feel, has always been of greater weight to what I think.

 

[Weird Harold]

I'm not comfortable posting in writing threads because I fear The Centipede's Dilemma. I'm always worried that if I think too much about the writing process I'll end up not writing. Writing, to my mind, is an unconscious process. If I became too conscious of what I'm doing and is too complex an action to be done consciously.

How about you? Do you fear The Centipede's Dilemma?

Nope, I don't really worry about the writing process while I'm writing, I save that for when I'm editing -- and editing is an entirely different thought process for me than writing.

I have several unfinished stories stalled in the editing process, but it isn't the Centipede's Dilemma that has them stopped, it's that they just don't "work" at the standard I'm willing to post for public consumption. I probably should go back and look at them and see if any of the recent writing discussions have given me any new insight on WHY they don't work.

 

[HeyNonnyNonny]

I don't think about techniques or styles when I'm writing - I write. However, I would be a worse writer (I know that's hard to believe) if I hadn't taken time to learn the nuts and bolts. I was lucky to be taught grammar and basic style at a formative age, and its stuck with me. I've learnt technical and journalistic techniques as I've gone along, and I'm starting to learn about fiction - proper, book learning, do the exercise writing. I can't imagine doing it any other way.

Its like watching sport. When a cricketer rocks forward and smashes a ball through the covers (think baseball/home run if you prefer, it'll have the same effect), half the time the commentator says, "he made that look easy."

No. For him, that WAS easy. Thoughtless, fluid, natural as breathing kind of easy. Like good writing. But nobody is born able to swing a bat with that kind of skill. I don't believe (though I'm less sure, because of the artistic element) that anybody is born able to write, without the same kind of hard, tedious practice. Sure it takes skill, intellect, originality, emotional depth, all that good stuff, but those are just the flourishes, the icing on a cake of solid, time-tested techniques.

 

[Dr_Strabismus]

I have the Centipede's problem too. It reminds me of the old Peanuts cartoon where Linus says "I'm aware of my tongue -- the way it just sits there like a big lump in my mouth".

There's a famous distinction made by the philosopher Hilary Putnam between implicit as opposed to explicit knowledge. The conscious mind is best used for absorbing and analysing explicit knowledge. But the conscious mind can often get in the way, like when you fall off the bike when trying to remember which way to lean when you turn.

Writing technique can and should be learned through a combination of practice, mentoring and explicit analysis. But when you're actually in the process of writing it's best not to be too aware of the rules.

Self-criticality is crucial to learning any craft or skill -- we all need to read critically what we've written to see if it works -- but it should be kept distinct from the "zone" of creativity.

I knew a succesful author who used to write pages and pages, for days and weeks, with no attempt at editing and critical reading of what she'd written. Once the flow slowed, she put on her critic's hat and hacked away the verbiage.

There are rules to writing -- but they're not fixed rules. Moreover there are no fixed rules about how and when to apply those rules.

For me, self-consciousness is far less of a problem than focus: I work intensely, and there's a "lead time", which might be hours, or even days, before I get the flow. Every distraction threatens to pop me out of the zone of focus.

 

[oggbashan]

My centipede's dilemma applies to assessing other people's work.

Once I start analysis of technique and effectiveness of the narration I destroy any pleasure I might have had in the work. Many classics of English Literature were ruined for me by studying them in depth.

Once started, I find it almost impossible to stop applying the analytical techniques I was taught. I try not to edit other people's stories. If asked I will advise on historical plausibility, but I avoid textual criticism.

I will vote on competition entries but I will rarely leave a PC or give feedback - because of my version of the centipede's dilemma. If I do comment it will be general and as far as I can go without destructive criticism. That sort of criticism is never helpful except for passing examinations...

Even editing my own work can have the same effect. I do edit as I go but with a light touch. If I edited in real depth I'd never submit anything. I have to for my fifty-word stories. That makes them very hard work. One of my 15 x fifty-word submissions takes a week or two longer than even a 3 or 4 Lit page story.

Og

 

[rgraham666]

Thanks all. A lot of interesting thoughts.

When I was reading Nonny's metaphor one of my own flashed into my mind, the martial arts.

I used to study those. I spent at least an hour a day practicing. Of which half was simply going through the basics. This meant that when I was sparring, when you don't have time to think, the techniques were available to me. They were hard wired into my system.

They still are. Even though it's been years I still have all the basic techniques available to me. My kicks need some work though.

I also understand og's point about how analysis can ruin your enjoyment of a story. It took me years to overcome my dislike of Shakespeare because of the way I had to learn it in school.

Thanks again.

 

[Penelope Street]

How about you? Do you fear The Centipede's Dilemma?

Not me.

 

[Alessia Brio]

How about you? Do you fear The Centipede's Dilemma?

Nope.

Granted, some of the standards I've set for myself do slow me down (because I don't write in draft mode), but nothing can STOP me.

 

[blanger]

great question

As a visual artist (don't write as you will soon see) if I think I am done. I get caught in the will it be accepted will it sell and then censor my creativity to the point of inaction. When I just do every thing is fine but getting to that place seems to get harder with every passing day.

So I think and do not do

 

[rgraham666]

Not me.

Quelle surprise.

 

[Huckleman2000]

..How about you? Do you fear The Centipede's Dilemma?

hmmm...Fear it? You mean it isn't the whole aim?

 

[slyc_willie]

I see writing in the classic Greco-Roman sense: I await the arrival of my muse. Sometimes Erato is standing in the corner, watching me with a little smile, other times she is draped over my shoulders with her cheek pressed to mine and her hands running over my chest.

In other words, the feeling, the intent, is always there, but the passion behind the writing varies. Some of my best work was 'banged out' in a matter of hours, because the entire story had blossomed in my head even as I wrote it. At other times, it took a few days, or even days separated by weeks of abandon, before one of my tales was finished.

I try not to think about my writing; why I do it, whether the story has been told before, if it is too graphic, etc. I write the way I would like to see a story written. If I stopped to count the hundred steps a centipede would take to move an inch, I would become too diverted, and lose the passion.

Instead, I let my fingers play the centipede's legs and just fly across the keyboard.

 

[Dr_Strabismus]

I see writing in the classic Greco-Roman sense: I await the arrival of my muse. Sometimes Erato is standing in the corner, watching me with a little smile, other times she is draped over my shoulders with her cheek pressed to mine and her hands running over my chest.

I know the feeling. And isn't it annoying when you've been waiting for half an hour and then three muses arrive at the same time.

 

[oggbashan]

I know the feeling. And isn't it annoying when you've been waiting for half an hour and then three muses arrive at the same time.

I usualy get Terpsichore when I want Erato. Urania was repsonsible for 'Breathless Stargazing'.

Thalia comes far too often, even when I'm trying to be serious.

Clio, Calliope and Euterpe worked with Thalia on my poem 'The Garderobe'.

Melpomene is responsible for 'Donna' and is wrecking my attempt at a fourth Brigit story.

Polyhymnia, a rare visitor, inspired 'Christmas Fifties'.

But where is Erato? Is she counting her legs?

Og

 

[rgraham666]

*BUMP*

Because Recidiva's thread bought this one to mind.

 

[NoJo]

The Centipede's Dilemma is a story about a centipede.

As you know, centipedes have a lot of legs. One day someone asked one how he walked.

He thought about it, and he never walked again. From that point on, every time he walked he thought about it. And walking was too complex an action to be done consciously.

A dilemma is a hard choice between two "lemmas" -- assumptions or propositions.

So that's more of a centilemma.

 

[neonlyte]

How about you? Do you fear The Centipede's Dilemma?

No... I'm happy with my limitations.

I do however fear the walking. I've been stuck twice and live in fear of it happening again. Might be a topic for a story.

 

[MagicaPractica]

How about you? Do you fear The Centipede's Dilemma?

I find that the more I read about the craft through books and my Writer's Digest subscription, the more ideas pop to mind, or a new way to do something. It just opens up new vistas for me.

 

[BlackShanglan]

I get stuck a great deal less now that I read and think more about my writing process. It looks daunting at first, but once you've gotten fluent with it, it's an enormous help. Now just reading about different writing strategies often gives me ideas immediately - either solutions to stories I've been stuck on, or ideas for new ones. My copy of Sexton's Master Class in Creative Fiction is so densely annotated and written-into that parts are nearly illegible; every chapter was a revelation of what had gone wrong on another unfinished work, and how I could now fix it. Bless him.

 

[keeblercrumb]

I like thinking. I just don't like thinking about thinking.

It has that stench of propriety about it.

I can smell it as well....... I like the creative process too much to fuck around with why and how I should do it..... which probably limits me to short story writing and poems... I suspect novelists must be more disciplined about the craft... but my influence was Kerouac and I am pretty sure he did not spend to much time on "how and why"... too much into the "is"...

I know I am influenced by what I read, etc.. I just do not find any enjoyment in analyzing it to a centipede’s death.