A cure for great writing

[icarus]

We've all had the problem over-thinking our writing, to the point where it stands in the way of the story. Recently a new friend of mine received a review from blackfall pointing out this very issue. Beautiful writing, but finds self admiring the writing instead of reading the story.

There is an artist's excerise to get over 'overworking' your paintings that can be adapted to cure self-conscious writing. I think.

What you do is have a pad of paper.

You focus on some object, say a lamp -- then write your immediate experience. You have thirty seconds to capture that lamp.

Then, without looking at your verbal sketch, you turn the page, and give yourself another object -- a tree. And thirty seconds to capture your immediate experience.

Turn the page. Don't look at it. Don't read it.

Then you look something else (keep them simple) and give yourself fifteen secons. Turn the page.

Do it again, fifteen seconds, for something else.

And again, and again. Each time you're not allowed to look at the results.

Then finally, give yourself a whole minute.

My art teacher had us do this for an hour. By the time we were done, I could capture the line of a figure in two or three swift strokes.

You can vary the times to something that's feasible for writing. But I think it should get you out of your head, analyzing your writing as you go. It's that self-consciousness that's standing in the way.

I'm gonna try it. Well, I haven't done the 'whole minute' sketch.



Curled, tangled wires, wrapped in black plastic, ready to ring and disrupt the night.

Blank, dusty screen, square -- blocky. Squats.

Tall, gleaming brass towers over tiny objects at its feet.

Books struggle on the shelves crammed every which way -- others neatly line up in battle formation.

Sagging, leaning sadly, waiting for their cohorts to return -- a plant streams down from the top shelf.

White stubs in black bases, melted slightly, leaning to the left.

Wood, tipped in brass, shadowed.

A green and white utilitarian smooth bottle.

Earthen, round bowl, containing congealed soup.

A half-eaten apple on the plate, brown from yesterday.


Eureka. It works. The writing grew progressively clearer and less purple. Hmm. Of course, this says entirely too much about my housekeeping, too.