If you want to write, then read.

"If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot.” – Stephen King

If there’s one thing that accomplished, including celebrity, writers have in common when it comes to advice is the recommendation to read plenty of books. You should be writing as much as you’re reading, if not more reading than writing, and though it may seem like a rather simplistic idea it is good advice. After all, nobody would expect a Michelin star chef to not eat good food or a rap artist to not listen to any music. Likewise, a writer cannot expect to write well without exploring the territory that surrounds them. If you refuse to read a book but insist that you will write something better, or at least on par, with those already published then who the hell do you think you are? There can be a tendency with some people where once they enter the clique of being a ‘writer’ or even, an ‘author’ then they are no longer required to mingle with the common people; reading their paperbacks and appreciating good stories because they can’t think up anything better themselves. Don’t be like this, and if you are already, then stop it. Not for me, or for every other writer who takes the Socrates type stance of ‘I know that I know nothing’ but for you, because you’re impeding your own artistic ability by being a jerk. 

Now, I admit, unless you are strongly dedicated to the task of reading then it can be difficult to find the time to do so. As we continue to move everything about our lives, from our banks to our food shopping to our social lives, onto the computer it seems as though our reading is taking the same route. As a society we appear to be reading less and less in the way of actual books and novels and, it kind of makes sense, we’re in an internet-led world now. Provided you’re in one of these countries, that is. It’s not necessarily a bad thing to be reading so much stuff on the internet. After all, it’s better to be reading articles, news stories and forums than not reading at all. Although this reminds me of a strange ‘study’ I read in a newspaper when I was a teenager (likely the Daily Mail) which basically said that because teenagers are now texting a lot then we’re creating a generation of writers. The article was written in defense of people saying that today’s youth are becoming gradually illiterate when it comes to their writing ability.  So, no, I’m not saying that texting is writing and that reading tweets or forums is real reading. Rather, I mean that reading articles on Cracked or other people’s blogs and such forth is doing no harm as they’re actual words, in sentences, with some intention to educate, enlighten, amuse or share information. But still, despite all of this being a big tick in the ‘you’re not a complete loss’ box there are actual benefits to picking up and reading a novel. I won’t even mention E-books here, it’s a book, I don’t like it but it’s a book so I’ll live with it.

So, the benefits of reading a novel when it comes to your writing ability? I’ve read that how reading will ‘broaden your vocabulary’ is really quite an important feature of book-reading but, though it certainly has many numerous benefits, a large vocabulary doesn’t technically mean you can write it all down in a format that people want to read. Combined with other writing abilities, a larger vocabulary essentially allows you to express what you’re thinking in a more astute way. If you’re continually grappling around for the right words then this will impede your ability to write and everything may just come up as though it were authored by an eleven year old. If you’ve got a good idea but not the words to express it you will rather promptly hit a brick wall, so expand your vocabulary in whichever way you find most efficient. Some people will do this by reading, some by trawling through a thesaurus or a dictionary. Eminem; Marshal Mathers, admits that he often just reads the dictionary in order to improve his vocabulary. For Mathers, the ability to connect words together with very limited thinking space means that he needs to know all the possible options already. Writing is very similar, although we don’t have to do it at the drop of a hat in front of a large audience of people. 

“And she, didn’t stop running ‘till she heard the sound of a breaking and a cracking coming up from the ground”

Ok so, novels have lots of words in them which through constant exposure are likely to expand your vocabulary. We know this, but what novels have that other forms of writing don’t have is a story, a plotline, character development, narrative structures, a means of developing tension, anticipation, excitement, and other general emotions. In short, novels already contain everything you want to learn how to do in your own book, the only difference is is that in other people’s novels they are in a different writer’s style to yours. I advocate a writer finds their own style of writing rather than copying one, otherwise what’s the point of having your own book, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be continually learning.  By reading you’re able to experience the tools and templates other writers have used that made their book a success and, again, the constant exposure will rub off on you. If you don’t read then you don’t know what success looks and feels like; you won’t know how to generate the appropriate emotions through your words that you want your audience to feel. Maybe you don’t know what realistic dialogue looks like. By checking around through several books you can get a feel for what dialogue is actually like when slotted between pages. There’s a great deal that can be learned from books and if you’re not usually a great lover of books then you can instead view them in this way; as tools, templates and instructions on how to achieve certain things in written format. It’s rather unimaginative and non-romantic but we’re not all the same and some people are very practical when it comes to their own work.

This brings us onto our next beneficial aspect of reading; the romantic and imaginative side of it all. Reading is a great way to trigger the creative streak inside all of us but those who enjoy writing are going to experience that creativity in relation to their writing, rather unsurprisingly. When you read you’ll come across little bits here and there that may prompt you into developing your own scenes, outcomes and perhaps even an entire story based on something small you read elsewhere. If you’re procrastinating or stuck on where to go next with your book then reading has the ability to unlock that writer’s block and remind you of why you love books and writing. It may even inspire you back over to your novel to continue with the story as reading something from an accomplished writer can not only be encouraging but it can cause you to apply it to your own book. If you find something in a book that sounds similar to something in your own novel then, rather than it depressing you, you can go on to mentally develop it further. Rather than copying what the author did you may go off down another road and use your own characters instead, maybe think about how they would be dealing with that situation or scene. Quite quickly, writer’s block is over. Reading other novels is a great means to unlock your imagination and inspire yourself as quite often writer’s block is from a lack of ideas on where to go from here.

If you find it hard to find time for reading then try short stories and poems. If you don’t write poems then it doesn’t matter as they still contain a means of enlightening and inspiring, though admittedly you won’t get much out of them in terms of literacy tools. Short stories then, are perfect, you can often by compilations of short stories that all revolve around a related topic. You also shouldn’t feel restricted to the genre that you write for; if you write fantasy, read science fiction, romance or thriller. It doesn’t matter as it is the new settings and different mechanisms that will make your book interesting. Also, good books are good books and they’re not restricted by the style or genre. If anything, look at a vast range of different but successful works and see what makes

Are we able to write anything original?

Maybe it’s a sweeping generalisation but I imagine that every author out there wants to write some original content. If all you are doing is essentially re-writing or rehashing the same stuff that people have seen a million times before then you would start to wonder what kind of writer you were. After all, creative writing is supposed to be… creative, not unimaginative, repetitive drivel. Unfortunately it’s fairly likely that everything you’ve ever written has already been thought of and is out there, somewhere, just waiting to jump out at you and knock your confidence down a few notches. Is there anything we can do about it? I’d argue that there probably isn’t.

Coming up with a new idea is rather like imagining what emptiness is like. Imagine what existed before the universe, or after everything has long since gone, maybe you’re imagining a big, blank, white slate or an empty black void. This is not emptiness; these are colours, it’s a horrible thing to put yourself through because we simply lack the capability to imagine what nothing looks like. We’ve never experienced it before and our mental capacities are severely limited if we try to think outside the human-body box. I’d argue that completely new, original, literally never thought of before ideas are also beyond our mental capacities; we need to build up ideas with pre-existing building blocks. Unicorns are made out of horses and horns, dragons are from pre-existing lizards and then there are several creatures inspired by twisted and unnatural versions of humans. 

Now, there is no rule out there which states that original bits of work by people; novels, poems, film scripts and so on, need to be, well, entirely original. Plagiarism has always been a big problem but it doesn’t have any actual legal grounding other than a vague sense of stealing. Copyright infringement is a whole different bag, plagiarism tends to be limited to somebody claiming that what they are saying is theirs is something that they themselves authored. Problem is, it’s rather difficult to prove as actual ‘never seen before’ ideas are hard to come by. 

Is 'creative plagiarism' common?

Here’s some examples of what I mean. I’ll do a quick summary of a book and you see if you know where it is from:

“A young boy discovers he is a wizard and heads off to a magical school to learn more about the craft. Under the guidance of an elderly and wise tutor he trains and improves his powers, his best friend is from a modest background and his enemy at the school is a complete snob.”

Harry Potter? Surely, Ron and Draco are in there, also Dumbledore and I mean, he discovers he’s a wizard and he goes to a wizard school for Christ’s sake. But, actually no, it’s not Harry Potter. It’s instead describing “A Wizard of Earthsea” published in 1968. Sorry, maybe I tricked you a little there, here you can have another try: 

“A young boy discovers he is a wizard. He must engage in a long and dangerous wizarding competition where he must solve clues also, at one point, rescue hostages which are imprisoned by half human, half animal creatures in order to become the winner of the competition. The wizarding world thankfully has its own wizarding hospital but, when not participating in the competition, he can kill time with wizarding chess or reading the wizarding newspaper.”

Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire! Surely, the tri-wizard tournament with the weird mermaids who kidnapped the contestants buddies… nnnoo.. this one is describing “The Adventures of Willy the Wizard” from 1987. This one actually had a lawsuit attached, serious business.

Harry Potter aside there are plenty of books and films out there which build upon long accepted groundwork ideas. Modern day vampires are not a patch on what they used to be but, even in Bram Stoker’s era they weren’t new concept. John Polidori put those fanged guys down a long time before Stoker did but, even Polidori could also have easily read the short German poem written by Heinrich Ossenfelder and nicked the idea from him too.

There are, of course, modern examples of creative plagiarism but it never stopped them from making any money. The Hunger Games has a very similar idea to Battle Royale and the 2009 film Avatar has been noted by critics as being extraordinarily similar to Dances with Wolves, or Pocahontas, or Princess Mononoke… or some other stuff. It’s a fairly cruel business to go around accusing directors and authors to be taking ideas as they please and rehashing them into something that has become popular as, chances are, that ‘original’ idea wasn’t ever original. After all, none of us live inside a vacuum of space whereby we are totally unaffected by the surrounding world. Most of us, I hope, read as well as write and as we read we’re going to be consciously and unconsciously picking up bits of ideas. It’s a natural process and it’s also fairly likely that you’ll end up writing down combined bits of stories that you had previously read without even realising what you’re doing.

Totally different films. Honest.

Does it matter?

So, if there is no such thing as new and original ideas then then what hope is there? Is this the end of creativity and imagination as we know it? Does this explain why every single film that comes out at the cinema seems more and more familiar as the years go by? Actually, maybe that last one is correct, but as long as it’s an enjoyable film who gives a damn. What makes a good idea, even if it’s not an original idea, is that it adds a different perspective to a pre-existing story. As long as you’re bringing something new to the table then your idea is worth writing down as contained within something old is a kernel of originality that is provided for by, you; a unique person. 

Creativity doesn’t have to be about coming up with completely new, miraculously created you’re your little writer’s vacuum. Instead, simply looking at something in a different way and getting that down on paper is, in itself, worthwhile. Perhaps you hold a perspective on something that nobody else has held. Perhaps you can put things together in a unique manner by combining components into something that is, if not completely innovative then at least a bit novel. 

We’re often tempted to discard bits of work because we realise how similar they are to pre-existing pieces of work, either by ourselves or somebody else, have you ever done this? Do you think you can have entirely new ideas, not formed from pre-existing concepts? Let me know!

How to find inspiration and banish writers block (temporarily)

So, first off, I should start by breaking the bad news to you; there is no formula. Sorry if I led you on there. If there was a formula then writers block would be a legend of old and everybody would be releasing incredible, deep and moving stories, films, songs, poems, you name it; it’d be out there. The second thing to remember is this: everybody suffers from a lack of inspiration sometimes. It’s not a sign that you can’t write a good book or movie script and it’s certainly not a sign that you should just screw it all and take up another hobby. Inspiration doesn’t tend to come when you tell it to come, but, there are things you can do to ease the creativity in a little.

 1. Stop trying so hard

Have you ever had that feeling of desperately trying to think of what something is called, but no matter how hard you think you keep coming up with the same two words but then, later on, when you’ve forgotten all about it you suddenly remember what it was bloody well called? It’s that ‘tip of the tongue’ phenomenon and it’s caused by a form of mental blocking where once you’ve thought of a wrong word then it’ll keep blocking out the correct one and stop you from accessing your mental lexicon. Remove the blockers – stop trying to remember it, and it’ll come to you. Inspiration works in a similar way and if you strain, stress and force it then it’s not going to come. Great ideas don’t come to people in designated slots and you’re more likely to block out something good than encourage it in. By rushing into matters you may also end up with sloppy, incomplete ideas that were not properly thought out so as a starting factor I’d recommend you relax and not go looking for something so hard. If you find yourself looking around at objects and things around you that are generally uninspiring and you’re trying to make them more interesting; then stop. You want something that’s already interesting; something that could have a deep meaning or that stirs an emotion within you. That is true inspiration.

2.  Get a change of scenery

So nothing around you is very inspiring, it’s all rather flat and boring actually. Well, I’m not suggesting you should start putting up new wallpaper (though that may have worked for Charlotte Perkins Gilman) or jet off around the globe to search for that one, amazing story that’s out there just waiting to be found. If you want to do that then that’s great, it sounds fun, but let’s be a little more practical for now. If you spend all day inside the house and you’re sitting there chewing off the end of your pencil then maybe you should just get up and go for a walk. I mean it; get the hell out of here. When you’re out and about your mind is going to be significantly more stimulated and that’s a great start; stimulate your mind, enrich yourself, experience as much as possible and inspiration will almost always hit you as long as you keep an open mind. A negative atmosphere such as one of frustration and monotony contained generally around the designated ‘computer and coffee’ region is going to keep you in an uninspired, featureless rut and you should do your best to break out of that.

If you do the same things over and over again you're limiting your experiences and limiting your options when it comes to finding something inspiring. A new perspective on life will guarantee you something new to write about and, failing that, you'll probably enjoy yourself along the way. As an additional note I'd also recommend to try doing things on your own as it is usually solitude that bares fruit (thank you William Penn) due to the tendency to retreat into your own mind and allow things to come naturally to the forefront. A lot of social interaction tends to push that away as you're more concerned with who you're around than yourself and, unsurprisingly, this isn't a good environment to try thinking up some good ideas.

Hey, we all fall out at some time or another.

3. Read everything with words on it, listen to everything that produces sound

“Read, read, read. Read everything -- trash, classics, good and bad, and see how they do it. Just like a carpenter who works as an apprentice and studies the master. Read! You'll absorb it.
Then write. If it's good, you'll find out. If it's not, throw it out of the window.”  - William Faulkner

A change of scenery isn’t just limited to your physical surroundings. I mentioned just now that you should stimulate and enrich your mind and this is probably the most important thing you can do. You need to read as much as is humanly possible and to not just limit it to the genre that you’re writing; you should be reading everything and anything. The more knowledge you hold within you then the more opportunities and doors you’ll be opening for yourself which will lead to not only a greater understanding of life, people, whatever the hell it is you just read about, but also a greater understanding of language, thinking and mental processes. ‘Mental processes’ is an odd thing to recommend you to improve on and I’m not accusing you of being unable to form coherent logical thoughts or simultaneously breathe and pump blood around your body, it’s more, a way of thinking. 5 years of Philosophy has beaten this into me and I recommend some Plato to get you started, it's fabulous stuff.

I also get a lot of my inspiration from music; there’s a lot of emotion within it that I otherwise cannot describe or express and it’s very easy to connect with. I don’t know why us humans love music so much but we always have done and it’s usually down to the general sound or lyrical content of the songs. My general theory is we appreciate music that we can understand, connect with or feel represented by. Since music isn’t always a story it’s also quite open-ended in how you’d like to interpret or continue it on in the form of prose and this open-ended-ness is always very beneficial when you’re looking for inspiration. Listen to music, whether that's music with or without lyrics, and imagine what it is expressing in the form of a story, scene or event. If you are able to connect with the emotions expressed within music, films or books then you're halfway there.

Lastly; I like to read the backs of shampoo and body wash bottles. It’s quite amazing how creative people can make those 100 odd words and frankly I don’t think I could ever write as emotively as Herbal Essences or Original Source. In all seriousness, nothing is beneath you when it comes to reading as it will teach you what is good writing and bad writing whilst simultaneously expanding your awareness, vocabulary and, hopefully, your creativity. If you find yourself reading a book and then thinking ‘I wonder what would happen if…’ then you’ve done it, go grab a pen and write that shit down.

4. Write something – yes, really.

It seems rather mean to tell you to write when that’s what you’re struggling with but, honestly, it works. When I lack the inspiration to continue with my novel I go and write something else for a bit; a short story, or the beginning of one, or some non-fictional things like an article (even if I never submit it) or maybe a small scene that I’d like to use later on for something I’m not quite sure of yet. Watch a film you’ve seen before and sit at your computer or take a pen and paper with you; now describe what’s going on on screen but in a nice, creative, descriptive manner. Watch something emotional happening on screen and write the facial expressions as people break down in front of you. Describe the view outside your window. Write down the feeling of hunger, of coming into the house from being out in the cold wind, of something beautiful and of something ugly. This is called freewriting and people like to recommend that you don’t stop or edit or do anything of that sort. I don’t think I could not edit if I tried but that would still be after a good 400 words or so. Bare in mind that everything you write down is golden as it can stay forever on your hard drive to be summoned open again whenever you need it. Once you’ve written down the sensation of banging your head against a wall; a sort of dizzy numbness, then you can use that later on if one of your characters ever has a frustrating lack of inspiration.

Once you start writing again you’ll rid yourself of writers block. It’s important to remember that writers block is partly accidental partly self-inflicted and you need to be kind to yourself to get rid of it. Like I said earlier; you need to remove the blocking atmosphere to help ease you out of it and writing just anything is good for that. As you write you may get little titbits of inspiration and you can jot those down as they come; however small they may be. There’s no need to get a little idea and then overthink it and try to turn it into some incredible storyline or scene, of course, if this all comes naturally then by all means write it down as quickly as possible before it goes again.

One day, if you work hard enough, you'll be as greater writer as this lady.

                                                  

These are just a handful of ways that I find to be really beneficial in simultaneously finding inspiration and overcoming a bad case of writers block – there are many more which I may post in the future but for now these are the ones I find to be most important. Of course I’ll add in a silent no. 5 which is quite simply; don’t give up after you’ve tried for a bit, even if you stop writing for a month, as long as you come back to it; as long as you think about it and keep that notepad relatively close within your reach then you’re doing just fine.

Why procrastination may actually be a good thing

Procrastination; why do we do it, under what conditions does its ugly head rise and, most importantly, how do we stop ourselves from doing it so often? In my last post I gave a few resources to help you stay focused on your work as the internet is notoriously guilty for giving us entertainment at a instant’s notice. Procrastination admittedly gets in the way

of a lot of things even if it’s as basic as replying to an email that’s been sitting in my inbox for over two weeks now. All I have to do is reply but I don’t, I do other things, a million other things when it would be so simple and easy to just do it right this second. But I won’t, why? Well, let’s look at what the point of procrastination really is and why maybe we shouldn’t try to repress it or let it run wild but rather acknowledge it and utilize it.

1.       You’re not committed

One of the reasons we procrastinate may be due to the fact that, deep within ourselves, we’re not committed to what it is we’re avoiding doing. Our procrastination is simply an indication that what we’re actually doing isn’t right for us and we should be doing something more constructive instead. Not emailing back a potential client? Maybe you just don’t like him or don’t want to work with him. When it’s concerning people you like and want to deal with, whether that’s within your business or personal life, you’re going to be quite eager to get back to them. Admittedly you may delay your replies as you think about an appropriately worded answer but if you’re avoiding it altoget

her then it’s probably a sign that really, you should be looking elsewhere.  Similarly when you’re writing a particular scene but you don’t find yourself ever wanting to complete it; maybe instead you’re writing other scenes to be put into the main story again at a later point, it may just be an indication that what you’re writing is too boring for even your readers to enjoy.

2.       You need time to think

We all need space and time to brainstorm properly as rushing never got anybody anywhere; apart from on a bus that’s about to drive away. If you’re going

too fast, not thinking things through or not sure where you’re going with something then taking a few minutes, or hours, to sit back and let things mull over for a while is surprisingly going to move things further forward. Books in particular need a lot of thought and, sometimes, a lot of planning even if it’s not the type of planning you write down. Giving yourself time to procrastinate means you can switch off for a minute and do something that requires zero effort and strain whilst, in the back recesses of your mind, you get yourself together and avoid the risk of writing something hollow or spontaneous.

I love that satisfactory feeling of completing all my goals, don't you?

                                                         
3.       You need to delegate or prioritize

Time management is an essential skill, not just for work, but for life too. Your procrastination is telling you that you don’t like to do something or that you need to waste a little time before continuing on with it. If you simply don’t like doing something and you have the ability to pass it on to somebody else, most typically in a work life scenario, then maybe you should. Continuing on with something you hate when somebody equally as a capable either doesn’t mind or quit likes it is a bad idea. If you hate something then it’s probably going to come across as sloppy, insincere, rushed, rude or thoughtless.

When it comes to prioritization’s relationship with procrastination, well, there’s a fine line. Both of them are behaviours that give you more time and that that is done instead of actually working but prioritization is generally a means of working out what needs to be done when and putting less important things further down your list. Procrastination is generally delaying or dawdling about but often you may find that you’re prioritizing, not procrastinating, and if so it’s time to ease up on yourself and not be so harsh. If you find yourself procrastinating when you have several quite important things to do and, rather than do one of them you find yourself doing another then it seems as though you’re just prioritizing instead. If you’re not working because you’re looking at pictures of cats on the internet, for hours, then you’re procrastinating.

4.       You need to do nothing

Following on from that last thought, sometimes ok to prioritize ‘doing fuck all’ instead of working. Our lives are often a mish-mash of social activities, work, chores, childcare, eating, exercise and hobbies that actual relaxation fails to make the cut. Social activities and hobbies are, to some, a means of relaxation but if you’re writing them in your diary then chances are you’re micro-managing things that are supposed to be a natural way of coming down from the high of life. Doing nothing is not necessarily a bad thing in fact, mentally and physically your health suffers if you are constantly running on the treadmill of life.

Nobody can stay on a task without a break, it’s cruel, and even the flimsy ’10 minute breaks for every 4 hours you work’ mantra of many work environments isn’t necessarily what the brain requires to maintain concentration and productivity. If you’re zoning out it’s not necessarily because you’re lazy it’s more likely to be a signal that you’re overworked and your brain is grappling for a way to recover from your stressful life. Meditation is popular for a reason; it allows people to intentionally disengage from everything including conscious thinking and to find a state of relaxation previously unattainable. I have never meditated but I imagine it to be something like a controlled zoning out with your eyes closed whilst you try your hardest to ignore everything in life. I can imagine how that would be peaceful. Whilst I’m not advocating people who have never meditated before to start meditating it could simply be that procrastination is a good opportunity to find a peaceful, less stressful, state of mind. It can be a means of restoring your concentration and enthusiasm for a task that you’re going to need to be doing for a long time. Short tasks, most likely, are much less stressful and won’t require sporadic walks in the park to keep you interested and stimulated.

Concerning concentration; in this study here concentration was shown to not be an on/off state of mind as many people previously assumed. The study showed that the mind tends to wander in situations that are not extremely challenging or requiring huge amounts of concentration. It does seem to depend on you as a person, do you find that you require a lot of concentration to write or is it more languid? If it’s requiring a great deal of concentration you may be stressing yourself out over a long period of time or, if it’s more languid, maybe you’re just not stimulated enough and it’s causing your mind to wander off.

The speeding train

I find most of my ideas from everyday, normal things. This is odd because my book is far from normal and ordinary, in fact, it’s damn well surreal. On a four hour trip from Norwich to Reading I took a pen, a notepad and my Ipod and just stared out the window for almost the entire duration. Mentally I went somewhere else. I wasn’t even thinking anything really; I was just staring out the window vaguely.

An unstoppable idea-train. This is actually a Norwich train, be impressed.

There was nothing in my head at all and nothing at all came to mind for quite a long time until, suddenly, I realized something in the novel. Something I’d left out. All of a sudden there was too much in my mind; the explanations, the reasoning, the timescales and the emotions all came rushing out at me and I had to work hard to put it all down before I lost my grip on it. I thought back through the entire novel to see whether it would fit and, bar one tiny reference, it would; it was already set up for me. It was as though it had always been there just waiting for me to catch up and figure it out. Whilst I was scribbling it down it was as though I’d just worked out the answer to a complicated philosophical question. I was writing with the sole purpose of not forgetting what had just happened somewhere in my previously vacant mind. You'd think there would be more control over it all, after all these are my ideas. Yet I’m still the one trying to keep up with them and stop them from either floating away or slamming into a brick wall.
                                                  

I’m not sure how other writers feel, is it as though you’re the puppet and not your characters? As if you’ve discovered something, not created something?