Fear of a Blank Planet

Two blogs in one day. Anyone would think I'm avoiding something.

And maybe I am. Yesterday I got an idea for a new short story. I have a structure, I have a plot, I even have a small handful of characters, and yet I find myself delaying.

All writer's know the problem of the blank page, where to start, what to say, how to say it. It doesn't even matter if, as in my case, you know what you are going to write. The moment when you open a new screen, helpfully titled Document1, and set out to write the first words, is one of fear mixed with hope. The fear comes from having to create something new, something interesting, something which will speak to your readers. The hope comes from knowing that you have the whole of time and space - real and imagined - to play with, and an almost infinite combination of words to use in new and surprising ways to act as your method of exploration. And that's the second source of fear.

I blogged a while ago about the journey never being quite what you expected, and that being the joy of writing. But it's also the curse, because you have to forge the path yourself. And if your route goes off course, then you have no-one else to blame. At the moment before you type your first word - take your first step on the path - all is possible. But once you start to move, you don't know if you are heading anywhere near the right direction until you get to your destination.

And, of course, that is also an exciting thing. The lure of the unknown. This is a journey into territory that has never been taken before. The story you write will be a combination of words which has never existed before. You are weaving a fabric from threads of your own invention.

The only way to solve the fear, and to feed the excitement is to write, and the more you do it, the more the excitement overcomes the fear. But the fear never goes away, and if it did I think the writing might die.

So, anyway, diversionary-blog over, it's time for me to go and write. I have my machete, my compass, and a flask of water. I should be okay. See you on the other side.



PS. Blog title courtesy of Porcupine Tree by way of Public Enemy.

The journey changes the destination

Having blogged last week about starting to write my conference paper, now that I've completed it I thought I would write about the process and the finished thing.

Something I forget until I go through the process, is how an idea can shift and morph under your hands as you bring it into being. Writing for me is always a journey, and I never end up quite where I thought I would be as I set out. It doesn't matter if it is a story, a paper or even a novel, the sheer act of writing changes the content and I discover new aspects and concepts as I travel.

The analogy of a journey is a useful one. When I set out I can see the first few steps of the path in front of me. I can see landmarks on the horizon, and I have a basic map in my hands. As I walk along the trail, the landmarks come closer and appear clearer in my vision. But somehow, up close, they never look quite like they did from a distance. They have more facets, more detailed crenellations and carving on the gargoyles. Eventually I find myself standing alongside them on the ridge, looking onward to the next section of the path, and a new set of landmarks in the distance. The path has taken a subtle turn and the sun is now off to the other side. Looking back, I can see the twists and turns which have pointed me in this new direction but which were hidden when I set off.

As I continue my journey I realise that I am going to end up somewhere different from where I intended; not where I thought I would be, but definitely where I want to be.

This has been the case with this paper. It still explores the things I intended to explore, but the journey has been richer and had more interesting cairns littering the side of the path than I realised it would. The result is something which I am pleased with and which has done a good job of telling me what I think about the subject.

Like many others, I write because I want to know what I think, but don't really know it until I put it down in words. However, in line with Heisenberg's Uncertainty Principle, in the act of examining what I think, I change it, so the destination I set out for is never the one I reach, not because it's really changed, but because the journey itself has changed me. And that, I guess, is really why I write, because travel broadens the mind.

And so it begins...

With the bank holiday weekend now passed, and the last of the teaching admin sorted for the year, today has been that red-letter day, the writing of the 'To Do' list.

It's quite long and contains a lot of entries which start with the word 'write', its brother 'rewrite', and its cousin 'finish'. As I go through what I want to accomplish over the summer it seems that I have more things to finish off - either by actually writing the remainder of an abandoned work, or by redrafting a first draft - than I actually want to start from scratch. Hopefully, as I work on those older pieces and reconnect with what made me want to start them in the first place, they will inspire other new works.

Among the things to work on are the novel I finished at the beginning of last year but have been unable to work on until now for a variety of reasons. However, in the last weeks, I have found my mind returning to it and starting to work on it without me being conscious of planning to do so.

I also have two plays - one for radio, one for stage - which are only each a quarter finished, but which still run round in my mind from time to time.

Add to this the range of stories, flash fictions and poems which have been written but never sent out and I have more than enough to keep me going.

However, these are not my first priority. I shall be starting with something which is much more like 'work'. I occasionally write study-guides for the EBSCO Literary Contexts database. I have a few of these to write by the end of June, so I shall be starting with these. They will be interspersed with writing my conference paper for the Great Writing conference in Bangor later this month. I'm presenting on my experiences of teaching both life-writing and fiction writing this year and the way the two crossed over, but more on that in a later blog post, I think.

Oh, and the first entry on the 'To Do' list (after the already crossed off 'Write 'to do' list', of course) is 'Write Blog post', so I shall start with the feeling of accomplishment that comes from crossing that one off. Now to start work on all those others.