26 April 2004
Ideas
Where do you get your ideas from?
I can't be certain, but I wonder if that isn't the most common question an author is asked at literary festivals and creative writing classes. But it's a false question.
I remember at one festival - or it might have been while I was presenting the Readers & Writers Roadshow - one author was asked where she got her interesting plot lines. With all apparent seriousness and an absolute poker face she replied:
'There's a website I go to.'
'Really?'
'Yes. If you remind me later I'll give you the address. Lots of authors use it.'
Of course this led to an embarrassed scuffling in bags for pens and notebooks and questions such as:
'Is it free? Do you have to be a member? Who writes the ideas?'
and so on. All for a website that could exist but which - in the form the author described - did not.
When Greg and I run workshops on creative writing, we find that shortage of ideas is not a problem. The smallest conflicts - of people or circumstances - can be encouraged to bloom and grow like many-faceted crystals. Look out of your window ... look at the face of the person beside you in the queue for the supermarket ...
Who are these people? Are they happy? Where are they going? What do they want? What is stopping them getting what they want? What thwarts their ambition? Who do they love? What are they guilty about?
No, the problem we encounter most often - and, I suppose, the one we have most experience in resolving - is one of commitment to ideas. Identify what you want to write about and carry it through to its conclusion - short story, novel, poem, song, artwork, script, whatever.
As teachers we have many techniques to help people push on with their ideas, trying to make sure they don't lose confidence. It's a very rewarding part of what we do.
Believe in your own path through the Labyrinth.
