Writer's Block Never More

[Liar]

Here's a really weird authorly question: Do you have any specific thought patterns when you map your stories or churn down the actual text? Some kinda set of muse-teasing jumper cables?

I didn't up until just recently, when I read about Aristoteles and the rhetorical topoi, a set of different angles of approach to apply to a particular situation to see if there are any good arguments to support your opinion. Having a set of topoi in mind is actually used in many other areas, like in mathematics, engineering, and in the field of law.

And in creative writing, although the setup of actual topics are quite different from those of old greek rhetorics, and everyone have to construct a set of topiucs that works with their preferredstyle of writing.

Here is mine. Whenever my muse decides to give me a brain freeze, those are the way out of my writer's block. If I toggle though these, I usually find a new way to get the plot and story moving. Some of those are old Aristotele's topoi applied on fiction, some I made up myself.

Opposites
Present, or clarify a conflict of opposing values, lifestyles, etc between characters.

Altered choices
Throw a character a screwball that takes away options and creates new ones.

Motives and minds
Focus on a character and clarify his or her inner thoughts and motivations.

Conflicting facts
Give either the reader or the character some inconequent facts that seems to contradict, and let them wonder about possible connection, until all is revealed later.

Cause to effect
Make a cause-and-effect chain about something.

Turning the tables
Give a fate that seems to be predestined for one character, to another one. Or put one character in another character's situation.

Macro
Take a broadperspective in a visual perspective, or in a general musing that applies the characters or plot upon life in general.

Micro
Zoom in and obsess over one detail that until then seemed just one of a million.

Comparisons
Compare situations, scenery or characters with something else, either an opposite or something similar.

Lies and masks
Let characters say one thing and think another.


This list keeps growing, but I've already had good use of it more times this last half a year then I care to remember.


Now, how do YOU think? What motions does your brain go through finding the right stuff to write? I know most of you probably don't think about this, but I recommed that you do. Because when you know how your writing muscles are working, you can adopt new ways to make it work even better.

#L, predicting a rapidly sinking thread.

 

[Goldie Munro]

Here's a really weird authorly question: Do you have any specific thought patterns when you map your stories or churn down the actual text? Some kinda set of muse-teasing jumper cables?

I didn't up until just recently, when I read about Aristoteles and the rhetorical topoi, a set of different angles of approach to apply to a particular situation to see if there are any good arguments to support your opinion. Having a set of topoi in mind is actually used in many other areas, like in mathematics, engineering, and in the field of law.

And in creative writing, although the setup of actual topics are quite different from those of old greek rhetorics, and everyone have to construct a set of topiucs that works with their preferredstyle of writing.

Here is mine. Whenever my muse decides to give me a brain freeze, those are the way out of my writer's block. If I toggle though these, I usually find a new way to get the plot and story moving. Some of those are old Aristotele's topoi applied on fiction, some I made up myself.

Opposites
Present, or clarify a conflict of opposing values, lifestyles, etc between characters.

Altered choices
Throw a character a screwball that takes away options and creates new ones.

Motives and minds
Focus on a character and clarify his or her inner thoughts and motivations.

Conflicting facts
Give either the reader or the character some inconequent facts that seems to contradict, and let them wonder about possible connection, until all is revealed later.

Cause to effect
Make a cause-and-effect chain about something.

Turning the tables
Give a fate that seems to be predestined for one character, to another one. Or put one character in another character's situation.

Macro
Take a broadperspective in a visual perspective, or in a general musing that applies the characters or plot upon life in general.

Micro
Zoom in and obsess over one detail that until then seemed just one of a million.

Comparisons
Compare situations, scenery or characters with something else, either an opposite or something similar.

Lies and masks
Let characters say one thing and think another.


This list keeps growing, but I've already had good use of it more times this last half a year then I care to remember.


Now, how do YOU think? What motions does your brain go through finding the right stuff to write? I know most of you probably don't think about this, but I recommed that you do. Because when you know how your writing muscles are working, you can adopt new ways to make it work even better.

#L, predicting a rapidly sinking thread.

Wow that is very technical and very organised. I'm afraid I do nothing as efficient - I think a story in my head. I get a character and a situation and a setting and then try and mould a story around that.

I am probably going through the steps you outlined in my head - then I start to write it. It usually moves and flows from my original idea.

Hmm maybe I should think about this more!

 

[Colleen Thomas]

I almost never preplan, the story just flows, almost like a movie and I just try to keep up with it. When the movie dosen't play, the words falter for me.

 

[Liar]

Re: Re: Writer's Block Never More

Hmm maybe I should think about this more!

Not too much. It is a good thing to have handy when inspiration is low, but if you actually have a flow, better not fix what ain't broken.

 

[Goldie Munro]

I almost never preplan, the story just flows, almost like a movie and I just try to keep up with it. When the movie dosen't play, the words falter for me.

I know what you mean! If I start a story and just don't get into it it just doesn't happen - not sure how much a kind of plan would help - but then again maybe it would!

 

[Guest]

Very impressive list there, Liar!

I'm gonna copy and paste that, if you don't mind! I can see some of it coming in very useful to me. You should charge a fee. Oh, but not to me, being your first customer.

I never preplan, either. That worked really well for my past novels, but this one is giving me real headaches. I think I was trying to be too adventurous. Anyway, I'll get there, with a little help.

Cheers, mate!

Lou

 

[rgraham666]

I'm finding that what works for me, is work.

I usually get blocked in the first draft. I can't think of what to say and how to say it.

So I tell myself 'it's just a first draft' and continue writing.

Once the first draft's done, I find it much easier to work.

 

[Liar]

Forgot one:

Chance
Throw in something completely unpredictable but with great effect, like a car crash, a blizzard, or a horny studmuffin and an even hornier bimbo bombshell getting stuck in an elevator.

 

[Lucifer_Carroll]

No.

Something like that English Comp bullshit is krytonite to my writing, turning mere writing blocks into full-on sabbaticals.

Most of my problems stem from needing to get into the proper mood to do a type of writing than a true composition bump. If the mood isn't there, the inspiration isn't either.

 

[carsonshepherd]

I do a lot of these things, but they happen naturally, like when I'm in the shower. Just shut down my mind and free the characters to speak. I'm with Luc. Anything "methodical" or "pre-planned" will turn a bump into a screeching dead end.

 

[Boxlicker101]

I get inspiration from sexy pics, either hardcore or softcore pics of women. Sometimes I get feedback from a woman reader and suggest that I could write a feature featuring her, and she provides a photo and her description and a description of what she likes or a fantasy she has or a role play she would like to do and I am inspired by that.

Before I start writing I get in the mood by first playing Hearts on the computer and then by watching a short porno movie. Frequently the movies I watch provide the inspiration for the story. It works as long as I don't get interrupted.

 

[doormouse]

I'm with them... WOW!!!!

I have my fave How To I live by.... this is going in my files too!!!!! Thank you

 

[Honey123]

I need to be very horny to write erotic stories. That seems to be my one plan. I think of a plot; figure out if I want it to be m/f or f/f and then take it from there.

Normally, I will lay in my bed and fantasize the sex. If I can get an orgasm from it - then I use it.

Liar, your plan is wonderful. But, I don't think it would work for me. I have such little time to just sit down and really plot out my stories.

 

[Mark James]

Follow the leader

Now, how do YOU think? What motions does your brain go through finding the right stuff to write?

The first motion my mind goes through is usually something like, "Wouldn't it be cool if...?"

An alternative to that is when a character that I've never met goes wandering across the stage of my mind. This usually happens when I'm in meetings, bored down to my socks.

If it happens like that, I try and follow the character and see where he goes and what he's up to.

That's the initial impulse. It's usually purely creative and spontaneous. It can be triggered by anything, a thought, an idea, something that someone says to me.

In the act of writing, things get more complex. I try as much as I can to concentrate in the early parts of a story on developing the leading characters as much as possible. I sometimes feel like a medium who lets the characters "come through" me. That way, I let the character lead the story, and I tag along.

I think that getting blocked is different for every writer. Experience has taught me that if I'm getting blocked, I'm trying to write my characters in a way that they don't want to be written. I can actually feel them resist me. If I try to push them in a direction that they don't want to go, my dialogue will come out sounding stiff and wooden, and the characters themselves seem to move like wooden dolls on broken strings.

When I first started writing and that happened, I used to despair. Now, I've realized that if I've created a strong enough character, they simply will not allow themselves to be written in a way that goes against the grain that I've created.

So, my solution for getting blocked is to go back to the point in the draft where things started going bad, sit quietly, and really listen to my character, without inserting my own voice. Usually, I end up deleting all the bad shit that I wrote, and I let the character come through. If I do that, the story will usually take off again.

I think the most important thing about getting blocked is to KEEP WRITING. If you stop when you're blocked, it's ten times harder to face the keyboard next time.

I'm not sure that I could follow something as organized as that list. My best writing usually happens when the "top" part of my mind (the part where that damn critic lives) is distracted by something. I write all rough drafts with headphones on, usually listening to something heavy like Black Sabbath or Guns & Roses.

I think that when I'm really writing, it's like magic. I don't know where the words come from. I feel like my fingers dance across the keyboard and the story flows onto the page. On those fantastic days, it feels alot like flying.