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Fighting Writer's Block
- Part II
Seven "Blockbusters"
By David Taylor
If you're a writer,
you can bet there'll be times when the words aren't flowing well
or not at all.
You're stuck.
The key is not
to panic and, most of all, not to let the negative tapes start
playing in your head ("Oh, I knew this would happen. I'm
just not a good writer. Never have been.
Even my kids think so."). That's usually when "stuck"
turns into "block." When stickiness comes your way --
and it will -- here are some tricks to get the motor running and
the words flowing. Some are hokey, and some are based on writing
habits we should foster for the long term.
Freewrite
Popularized by
one of my heroes, Peter Elbow, freewriting forces you to set an arbitrary amount of time,
start the timer, then begin writing
as quickly as you can without stopping for anything until the
time period is over. The writing can focus on a specific problem
or remain unfocused, its purpose being merely to generate thought.
Regardless, once you set pen to paper or fingers to keyboard,
you cannot stop for ANY reason: not spelling, not grammar, not
embarrassment, not lack of words. If the words aren't there, you
type/write, "OK, words aren't here, I'm trying to get them
back, here they come..." and keep up the flow for the entire
period of time you've set for yourself.
When teaching,
I make all students (even graduate students) keep freewriting
journals and turn them in once a week. More than anything else,
the daily exercise helps students over their fear of writing and
puts them in touch with the inner voice that gives writing its
authenticity. Freewriting also helps
to clean out the synaptic junctions that lie between brain and
fingers, junctions that tend to rust over when writing isn't a
habit.
Use freewriting
to get started on a first draft, to talk through problems, to
record daily observations for use in your work, or just as a way
to let off steam. The key is to write fast, because then you will
write without fear.
Copy
and Write
Sometimes I take
out a favorite author's work, read a paragraph or sentence, then
try to recreate it on the page. You can get inside that writer's
language and its rhythms when you do. My juices are sure to start
flowing when typing, "I refuse to accept the end of man.
I believe that man will not only endure, he will prevail, that
when that last ding-dong of doom sounds from the red and resounding
shore, there will still be one tiny, inexhaustible voice crying
out in the wilderness ..." (William Faulkner, Nobel Prize
acceptance speech). But be careful that old drunk isn't perched
on your shoulder when you start your own ding-donging.
Reread
and Notate
Put your research
materials beside your keyboard. Read through them with your fingers
on the keys. As you read, react to the materials -- explain, speculate,
relate, add to, explicate, argue with, rant. In other words, use
writing to explore the materials. At the end, you'll have a huge
mess on screen or on paper. But some good stuff will have been
made concrete, and you'll be raring to get started.
Write
to Someone
Thank goodness
for caring, understanding friends, students and family. There
have been times when the best way for me to get started on something
was as a letter to someone. The someone
represented in some fundamental way the actual audience I needed
to address in the piece.
This works because
we're so familiar and comfortable with letter writing, and especially
because we have internalized the trick of matching our materials
to the person we're writing to. As a result, letter writing provides
an easy way to get our voice into our materials with a slant that
is right for the audience. The trick is to know whether to mail
it or not.
Write
Dialogue
Set up a conversation
on your screen between yourself and some person who's asking you
about your topic. Make it someone you have a strong reaction to.
As you answer his or her questions, you'll discover the reasons
you're sitting there and also the words you need to get started.
Write
Invisibly
This will be
disorienting at first, but is definitely worth it. You can't edit
and correct what you can't see. Ha, ha. So, make your computer
screen go black by turning down the brightness control or some
other trick. Not using a computer? No problem. Stick a sheet of
carbon paper between two blank pages and write on the top with
an empty ballpoint pen. It's amazing what cutting yourself off
from visual reinforcement will tell you about how much you have
been relying on headwriting and hypercorrectivity.
Write
About Writing
When you're totally
stuck, you still have this outlet: describe your feelings about
writing. Use writing to vent about your blockage. Rail against
Mrs. Grumpy in the fifth grade who always criticized your handwriting
and made you feel hopeless and hapless. Write about what you think
is blocking you. Write about how the writing went yesterday. Write
about what you hope to write tomorrow. Pretty soon, you're putting
enough words on the page that the dialogue between it and your
head is back on track. Writing about writing will teach you something
about yourself as a writer, too, and you may want to keep a writing
log about these concerns on a daily basis. Such a "Writing
Progress Log," when kept over a period of time, can help
you pinpoint what factors cause the writing to go well, poorly,
or not at all.
But
don't do this:
1.
Don't reread stuff you've already published. Doing so encourages
the fearful reaction: "But ... but can I do it again?"
It also allows you to procrastinate and allows you to rely on
previous writing tricks instead of challenging yourself to grow
beyond them.
2. Don't spend
time editing what you wrote the day before. Rereading it to get
back into the flow is fine. But remember, there's a time to write and a time to edit. If it's not time
for the latter (when the draft is done), get your butt in gear
and stop procrastinating.
3. Don't talk
to others about what you're writing. Yes, I know a lot of advice-givers
disagree with this one. But here's my experience, especially with
fiction and screenplays: You can talk the life right out of your
story. You can also get opinions and ideas that will get in the
way of your own. And you can also end up putting more pressure
on yourself because now others have specific expectations of you.
There are times to seek input: but I don't think it's during the
gestation stage when you're in the middle of those first few critical
drafts.
This Article was found at: http://www.articleblast.com/
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