The Hero or Villain Inside

I know it sounds crazy, but the Christchurch earthquake is inspiring me to dig deeper into my characters’ personalities. And into my own.

I’ve heard of so many gut-wrenching stories, so many happy stories, so many funny stories. I’ve seen so much heroism, so much selflessness, so much simple kindness. I’ve also watched in disbelief as others have looted and scammed–or at least attempted to–people who are already living on the disaster’s knife edge.

So many of us wander through our lives as “middle of the road” humanity. But when something like this happens it seems to flick a switch in the head, and that switch turns us on to what we really are inside: a hero, or a villain. Read the rest of this entry »

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I think every New Zealander in the world is in shock at the moment. Most of us are glued to media coverage of the events happening in Christchurch; the catastrophic destruction of life, the breakdown of infrastructure, the stress that comes with crisis in both the short and long term–all to people we know and love.

It seems wrong even to consider relating “creativity” to this sort of situation. But as I watch the way the national and international community is coming together there I realize there isn’t any other way to deal with a catastrophe. It has to be dealt with a different mind set. We’ve got: Read the rest of this entry »

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Tags: Creativity

It wasn’t what I was going to share today but it’s certainly on topic. We’ve all heard of that mythical “Thinking Cap”. Well, here it is. The real thing, hot off the press…workbench…lab test…

A Thinking Cap To Promote Creativity.

I’m trusting you to come back and have your say here in the comments!

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When it comes to brainstorming we’re encouraged to accept each and every idea. There should be no boundaries. No filter.

Sometimes, however, having no boundaries can itself cause us problems with BPS or Blank Page Syndrome. By constructing some simple boundaries we can corral our creative mind, saddle it up, and ride it along paths it might not ordinarily take.

For example, when I pulled this out of my Brain Dump (a collection of ideas for when I need a kick start) I stared at it in horror and seriously considered putting it back in the jar and choosing again.

Use all of the following in a poem:

• a culture of quickness
• merciless blue sky
• where we still simmer

But that would be cheating (sigh) so I stuck with it and after some thought–and a couple of days where summer temperatures soared, sunbathers broiled on beaches, and cases of severe sunburn rocketed–came up with this. Read the rest of this entry »

Popularity: 15%

Tags: Creativity, Parameters

At the beginning of this series on creativity I asked if anyone had something specific they’d like covered, and you came back with some interesting problems. Here’s one.

Generally I know what I need a scene to achieve…[but] I blank on the first line of the scene – and if I can’t get that right the rest of the scene doesn’t happen.

You’re playing my song. I like to start at the beginning, work my way through to the end, then stop. Trouble is, it doesn’t work like that, and I can waste hours getting that lead-in to a scene “just right”.

I don’t know if this will help, but here’s what’s working for me at the moment.

As an editor I’m going to edit this sucker into a paper bag and we all know it. My problem is not in the editing. My problem is in the actual down and dirty writing. Soooooo….

I give myself something to edit by bypassing my weakness (the good ol’ blank mind perfectionist) and dumping myself straight into the action where I’m using a particular writing strength–in my case, dialogue.

My problems are the lead-ins to and exits from a scene, but the middle is sort-of okay. So I start somewhere in the middle.

Let’s say I know that at the beginning of the scene I want the heroine and secondary romantic interest to be on the dance floor, the villain to be on his way to ask the heroine to dance (with the aim of interrogating her while they whirl around the room), and the hero to be steaming down on the lot of them determined to keep the villain from getting his hands on the heroine, and itching for a chance to kick the secondary RI’s backside.

What’s the part of the scene that appeals to me most–that I think I can write with the minimum of angst at the moment? I’ve already decided that this scene is going to be from the hero’s POV, so my choices are:

1. Hero watches heroine and SRI and thinks dark thoughts–introspection
2. Hero intercepts villain–dialogue and subtext, hinting at backstory
3. Hero attempts to discourage heroine from dancing with villain without coming right out and saying the guy’s setting her up (not knowing that the heroine’s primary motivation for being there is to dance with the villain for her own “setup” purposes) dialogue, subtext, introspection, some backstory drip-feed
4. Hero fumes as villain waltzes off  (literally) with the heroine–leaving him with the SRI and a potentially violent confrontation. dialogue, subtext, introspection, foreshadowing

I’m not in the head space for dark introspection at the moment, and that sort of thing needs a careful hand at the best of times so forget 1. I’m not sure what my heroine has up her sleeve in number 3, so I’ll pass on that. Which means I’ll also have to pass on 4. And that leaves me with 2.

So I pick it up where the hero has actually intercepted the villain (no lead-in, no descriptions, no setting–because I suck at all those). The hero’s goal is to stop the villain from getting the chance to be alone with the heroine and feed his lies into her shell-like ear. The villain’s goal is to find out what the heroine really knows about his situation and at the same time spread a little love about the hero and his activities. And all of this poison has to be administered with taste and discernment under the watchful eye of the glitterati.

Okay, I’ve rabbited on. What am I saying?

I’m saying that you need to find one area of strength in your writing–yes, you have more than one, believe me–and use that strength to help you bypass the weakness that’s holding you back.

ACTION PLAN:

1. Articulate your particular weakness–i.e. blanking on the first line of a scene
2. Take a specific step to bypass this weakness–place yourself firmly in the middle of a scene
3. Choose one of your areas of writing strength–e.g. dialogue.
4. Write as much of that scene as you can entirely from that point of strength.
5. When you can’t write any more DO NOT OBSESS. Move on to the middle of the next scene and begin the process again.

Don’t get bogged down in the detail because you’re going to revisit the scene and do any nip and tuck work later.

Try it, and let me know in the comments how it works for you.

Popularity: 12%

Tags: Creativity