12. Be open to inspiration
Do
you feel you walk with eyes downcast? Do you notice
when fruit trees start to bloom? Are you aware when your co-workers
change their hairstyles? Are you a noticing kind of person, as Jacques
Cousteau used to say?
If you answered yes to those questions, you have a kind of head start. Because you are interested in the details that make up our lives. And that is very important to a story teller.
Alongside those things, however, are the ideas, the abstract
thoughts that give depth and resonance to your work.
I – like many people – like to use quotations to sum up thoughts and feelings. I always have put quotes at the beginnings of my books. When the Labyrinth website was live – it is now an archive – we published a different quotation every day, as well as quirky Did-You-Know? pages, medieval proverbs and so on.
Here are some that have inspired me, starting with
the Latin saying:
Cucullus non facit monachum (the cowl does not make the monk).
Then Rückert's beautfiul line:
Dem Wandersmann gehört die Welt in allen ihren Weiten (to the wanderer belongs the whole wide world).
Finally, Jacinto Benavente's sound and always-topical common sense:
El pretexto para todas las guerras: conseguir la paz (the excuse for all wars: to bring peace).
