Avoiding the blank page
“In order to write about life first you must live it.” Ernest Hemingway
I found this piece from the Adjacent Possible newsletter really inspiring, and I’m planning to make it a habit in this new year.
It’s from Steven Johnson’s interview with David Byrne -
Steven: Do you have a method for capturing fragments of ideas that you then go back to to expand into a song?
David: Oh yeah, yeah. I have text things; I have things right here on my desk. I have just a few lines; sometimes I have just the title of a song that comes to me and I write it down and I go: “expand on that, I think there’s something there.” And then I also have in my computer here a whole lot of musical ideas that have maybe a melody — a nonsense word melody, awaiting words.
Steven: And do you just sit down in your home studio noodle with the record button on?
David: Sometimes, sometimes I do that. But usually I need something to start with. It might be in some cases a lyric that I’ve written already. Or I might start with just a rhythm. That’ll help. It’s hard to start from nothing. So I’ll accumulate all these very little beginnings, and so that means when I come back, I’ve got something to build on.
I’m not familiar with this verb to noodle - I looked it up and apparently it’s a method of catching catfish with one’s bare hands! Thinking on it, that’s a really brilliant metaphor for the search for new ideas, which are always, I guess, slipping out of our inept hands.
The article is worth reading in full - and I would recommend the newsletter. There are regular pieces for free subscribers, as well as extras for those who pay a subscription.
I already keep odd ideas in my writing notebooks, and when I’m stuck I flip through them, looking for inspiration. However, I am very lackadaisical about it and I think I might try to spend some time with this every week - not just making notes of any ideas which turn up, but spending time thinking about them and seeing if they might fit in to my current or future project.
He also quotes one of Hemingway’s pieces of writing advice - which I think I first discovered in a NaNoWriMo pep talk.
“The most important thing I’ve learned about writing is never write too much at a time,” Hemingway told his protege Arnold Samuelson. “Never pump yourself dry. Leave a little for the next day. The main thing is to know when to stop. Don’t wait till you’ve written yourself out. When you’re still going good and you come to an interesting place and you know what’s going to happen next, that’s the time to stop.”
I think that might just be why the outlining works so well for me - because when I come to the actual first draft I do know what’s coming next.
Of course, it doesn’t help while writing the outline!
Ann
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Very interesting about the songwriting. With me the music comes first, sometimes in a dream. If I don't wake up in time I can forget it. The words come later, all at once or not at all. It is difficult, but nowhere near as difficult as writing a novel....!