How It All Comes Together

I was talking to a friend last night, a writer whose work I like, about his forthcoming book, a novel told in a chronologically fragmented way. I asked how this approach had come about, and he told me that he didn't see the benefit of pressing the life of his protagonist, an old man, into the shape of a typical narrative. It was too complex--strands of the book stretched across time and across pages in a way that made his chosen structure feasible, if not inevitable.

While working on it, he'd asked a mutual friend, another novelist, what he though of this approach. And our friend told him that he ought to just write the book in the order it came to him.

It's possible to assign too much power to this perhaps overly simplistic piece of advice, but I cannot count the number of times I've disobeyed it, only to realize I'd taken a wrong turn. Almost all my best stuff, whether it has a predictable structure or not, retains the shape I imagined it having when I started. The actual content is often radically different, but the structure, no.

I'm not sure why this would be. I'm a big believer in the Drastic Rewrite, and I like to think there's nothing I've done in a draft that isn't open to possible revision. And indeed, there is a major exception in my work to this initial-conception rule: my last novel, Happyland, which was completely reimagined from its early drafts. But perhaps that doesn't count--what was eventually published (in severely abbreviated form, in serial) was essentially a new novel, formed out of the busted-up pieces of the original idea.

Even if inspiration isn't the main ingredient in the creation of a good book, it is real, and ought to be respected. Warily, of course--because some inspiration is stupid. But respected nevertheless. I feel as though an idea that hits hard and sticks to the roof of your mind must have something going for it, however coarsely it expresses itself at first. Inspiration isn't magic--it's the product of countless hours of subconscious cogitation, the opening of a painted-shut window you've been idly rattling at for ages. It may be untrustworthy, but it is meaningful, and it can lend direction to the grunt work to come.

"Recharging"

Ach, how I hate that metaphor, when it's applied to acts performed with the goal of revitalizing the creative drive. As though getting yourself to write something were analagous, in some way, to plugging in a cell phone overnight. But it's handy enough, I suppose, to have some shorthand for this mysterious process; it's different for everyone and impossible to qualify.

I just got back from New York, and generally a trip to the city serves, for me, as a major source of remojofication. But not this time, for some reason. I attended a lit thing, hung out with some rock and roll cronies, and had a generally fine time...but for some reason, the expected juicing did not arrive. Instead, I found myself thinking, as I walked through Union Square, Jesus Christ, the world is freaking packed with people, and I just pined for the sofa, a glass of wine, and a heist novel.

Where does creative energy come from? After ransacking the lumber room of the mind, day after day for a couple of decades, searching for some mislaid scrap of it, I still don't understand what it is I'm looking for, or how it is I've manage to find it, when I do find it. It is fickle stuff, as mysterious and elusive as Sasquatch, and indeed, sometimes the process of capturing it is akin to slogging through a rainforest, scanning the humus for footprints.

It's related to happiness, I guess, and to confidence, and to the acceptance of the self. But not all that closely. I'm feeling quite happy, confident, and self-accepting today, and I don't feel like writing shit. Rhian's been reading about Sylvia Plath (I suspect you'll be hearing more about her tomorrow), and it looks like she wrote some of her best stuff in the throes of misery, humiliation, and self-loathing.

Sometimes a change in the weather inspires me. Sometimes the eighth straight day of rain. Sometimes it's a good song, or a horrible song, or the suffering of others, or their joy. Sometimes I'm moved by jealousy, or fear. Or admiration, or lust. Something somebody says, or that I wished they'd said. None of it makes the slightest bit of sense. Today, even writing this blog post is an effort. Tomorrow I might knock out ten pages. (Not bloody likely though, I'm afraid.)

What gets your motor running? Or rather--what has gotten it running in the past? Because past performance, as I'm sure you're aware, is no guarantee of future success.