Let's Talk: The Writing Process, Part 2
Since I started down this path of discussing the writing process the other day (it's here), and since so many people have responded in so many ways to that post, and since Bach's Christmas Oratorio is blasting out of my speakers at this very moment, and since I've been writing all day until now, I thought I'd take a few moments before I disappear out to the deck with a book (this one--one of the best I've read in a while) and add some more thoughts to that question of the writing process--which is a subset of the larger, creative process. (That picture, by the way, is our driveway--through the woods to our house.)
OK, here goes: I utterly reject the blather of romanticism, of the wandering free spirit who writes well. I'm sure there's someone out there like that. But every writer I've ever met has the same answer. Creativity is not about freedom. It's about control. And ritual.
Let me go back to explain. When I used to teach writing on the college campus, I had two hard and fast rules: no journaling for my class and no writing the first paragraph of anything until you were done with the thing.
Why no journaling? Because it encourages a view of writing as utterly free-form. Listen, I'm all for keeping a journal. I keep one myself. I have volumes of them, in fact. And intriguingly, they're all hand-written, not typed into files. I find that the writing of words--the actual writing of them, so old school--puts certain glorious constraints on me that the computer does not. Mostly, I feel the words in my body.
But when I write professionally--even counting this blog entry--I use the computer. It affords me a different sort of constraint. I write faster, sure. But I also write in a form, as it were. And one that allows me to edit instantly without smudging the page. And one that gives my words a rather formal appearance, not my usual scrawl.
I want my journaling to be different from my professional writing. It's not that I don't want to be expressive and intense. Of course! Anybody who's read the HAM book knows my voice can be both snarky and self-deprecating.
All that said, I didn't want my freshman keeping journals because I believe writing to be a more formal process. Sure, I get ideas in my journals. But the free-form process does not add up to nuanced, gorgeous creativity--any more than fingerpaints add up to a Bellini. When Mia Michaels or Twyla Tharp construct a dance, they don't throw themselves around the stage, don't wander around free-form. No, they take that energy and channel it into form. (If you don't know who Mia Michaels is, click here and watch a routine. And in case you don't know, I'm a dance fanatic. I go to every dance performance I can find. I cannot walk across a flat floor without tripping. I shove my body through space. Dance simply undoes me.)
All of that's why I also never write the first sentence first. Because it's too hard. To begin is to end.
The form of the creative process also has to allow for discovery. More often than not, I find that by the time I've finished a piece of writing, whether a small article for an online magazine or a big book, the last sentence is indeed the one that should have come first--or close to it.
I used to tell my students to start writing, get to the end, take that concluding paragraph, lop it off, put it up top, and start rewriting the piece from there.
In the end, my creativity is found in ritual. It's important that I set my alarm in the morning. It's important that I play music. It's important that I have my coffee. It's important that I sit at my desk. It's even important at this point that Dreydl sleep beside me. Inside of all that ritual, I can reach the liminal state--and the incredibly important state of flow.
I can write a lot more about those later, and I'd love to hear your thoughts on all this, but for now I want to leave you with this notion: that the sacred is most often found in ritual. (I'm not talking religion here, although I could be.) That creativity comes not in freedom but in the accepted and acceptable constraint that ritual brings. Like the Jewish holidays (happy Rosh Hashanah, everyone!) or the Christian liturgy. They structure time itself, the year, the chaos of passing moments--and in so doing allow the possibility of the sacred, which at its heart is creativity, no matter what Stephen Hawking thinks.
Like happiness in marriage. The boundaries of the social contract lay down the possibility for both personal growth and genuine contentment. Yes, of horrible captivity, too. And unhappiness, to boot. But the borders set up the possibility of freedom, happiness, and creativity. In life, in love, and in writing.
creativity, how to write, liminal, ritual, sacred, writing, writing life, writing process
Reader Comments (9)
I find when I have more structure in my life I get more done. For example- when I got let go of my job I had all the time in the world. But I found that it was like walking in a open field, wonder and wander. But with a work schedule and some routine (ritual) to my day I get more done - even though my time takes me away from the farm. I also find that I am more present and my time seems fuller, if that makes sense. I was in a bit of a cloud when all I had was time - perhaps I need some outer constraints to help me map out my day . I suppose everyone is different.
Good post!
*laughs* First and foremost, I have to say "I shove my body through space" may be the most wonderful image ever. Maybe I'm biased, being half-Newfie and therefore rather familiar with that sensation myself!
Secondly, I'm pondering. Are you genuinely that strict with your start-at-the-end approach? See, while I agree that you should have an idea as to where you are going (I'm no pantster--I can barely put down the next word without at least a mental outline), often times, my novels are a hodge podge at the beginning. I may write a chunk at the end, but mostly what goes down are those heart-rending moments, the portions that set my blood afire and then, once a formal outline exists as well, I generally work chronologically. That is to say, Chapters One through X. Do you simply want your students to know where they're going and this is the most distilled way to teach that?
Of course, now that I say that, as I say it, I realize that my structure is miniature ritual. (Can ritual be miniature? I suddenly feel it is or is not.) Reading this post, I *have* to believe you've read that Tharp book at some point, by the by. What's interesting is that I think I have my ritual for creation, but not for productivity. That has ever been my failing--consistent production. This requires a ritual, I am slowly learning, but can you enforce a ritual? Did you actively develop yours or was a pattern that you grew into?
My apologies, as always, my murmurings to myself tend to grow into overbearing monologues.
--Nik
Nik: I don't know that the whole don't-start-at-the-beginning thing works for fiction--although I do see that you're starting at other spots. I find the tyranny of openings often scared students spitless--and me, too, at times. That first sentence, that first paragraph. It's like that with anything creative. But in nonfiction, the end tells the tale. And so when you get to the end, you know where you wanted to start, if that makes any sense.
I do think structure matters, Greg. I don't think anyone did anything without it. Otherwise, it's just chaos. Or your flat field, to use a great metaphor. Back a million years ago, when I was married to a woman (yes) and playing it straight, I used to say that I saw my life as a huge meadow, open to the horizon in every direction, not a tree in sight. I said that as if it were such a positive thing! I imagined all the freedom. Of course, I was mostly imagining all my depression/repression. But that's another story. I can definitely say in all the many years since I came out, my life has had a lot more hills, a lot more bumps, and a lot more landscape all around.
M.
life begins to be about the view and our place in the whole messy, muddy, beautiful Spring.
take care- Greg
One of the best metaphors I have ever come across about freedom in structure applies to life in general and creativity in particular: the sonnet. The sonnet is one of the most rigid and demanding forms of poetry there is: the number of lines, rhythm, and rhyme scheme are all set, and properly written, the first stanza must pose a question and the second answer it. Within that rigid structure, however, the writer has complete freedom to say what s/he wants, and still compose a sonnet.
As I've gotten older, my life has gotten steadily more structured, some of it self-imposed and much of it by circumstance. Having a child, in particular, has established a very fixed (but ever-evolving) pattern to my days and seriously constrained my free time. But within those constraints I've learned the value of even the smallest chunks of time, and what you can do with them creatively, and as a result five minutes now can take me to places I couldn't have gone with endless hours at my disposal ten years ago.
And last but not least, a word about journaling (as someone who's been keeping a journal since the age of seven): I don't think of journaling as writing. Journaling is what gets you out of your own way so that you *can* write. At least that's what it is for me.
Great, thought-provoking blog post. Thanks for continuing to share your thoughts and process.
Ooo, I love that bit about journaling is that you do to get out of the way so you can write. That's brilliant. I've always thought of journaling like therapy: you go to therapy so you can go about your life, but you don't torture everyone around you with your therapy all day long.
M.
Exactly--I think of journaling as the cheapest form, most readily available form of therapy there is. And I shudder to think of writing without it!
What Roving Lemon said about creativity and the sonnet reminds me of one of my favorite quotes about creativity. It comes from The Accidental Vegan by Devra Gartenstein: "I learned in junior high school that poets choose to work in haiku and composers confine themselves to the sonata because constrictions force artists to be nimble and innovative."
I've been limiting my choices in my cooking and my knitting. I've found that not only does it force me to be more creative with what I have, it forces me to be satisfied with what I have. Funny thing is, I'm more satisfied than I've ever been and don't seem to be be tempted by the "wants" so much.
Sally: Yes, the key is less. Bruce and I tried to sell our house this summer (no go) because I'm determined to downsize big-time. I don't want to walk around life (to riff on Wordsworth) trailing clouds of stuff.
I think it's important in food, too. I think less is so often more. (Except when it comes to banana upside down cake.)
M.