Blog Archives

6 lessons from history's creative minds

28/11/2013

Myths abound about how to nurture creativity. If I drink like Ernest Hemingway will I come up with a twenty-first century For Whom the Bell Tolls and bag myself the Nobel Prize? Somehow, I think it might take a bit more than that, but it needn’t stop me opening another bottle of wine.
Many of us believe we have to do things in a certain way to get the creative juices flowing. It’s hard to let go of our treasured beliefs but do any of these routines actually work? Mason Currey has trawled the daily rituals of history’s creatives to identify six common themes. It’s not exactly a randomised controlled trial but, if you’re looking to boost your creativity, it’s a reasonable place to start. As you’ll see, I don’t measure up so well against the criteria. Can you do better?

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The obstacle within: lessons on character from a novelist and a psychotherapist

24/11/2013

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There’s lots of advice for writers on overcoming the internal barriers to making space for our writing, but I haven't found much on creating characters who similarly sabotage their own pursuit of their goals. Generally, we’re encouraged to create protagonists with clearly defined aims who go all-out to achieve them, although novelists who subvert this can still deliver a page-turning tale.

Tied in with my latest debut novelist Q&A I’ve been considering the character of Iosif in Anthea Nicholson’s The Banner of the Passing Clouds. His internal obstacle to happiness feels so real to him, it has a physical presence and a fear-inspiring name. Iosif is defined by his inner Stalin, compelled to appease him even as he wrestles against him. He cannot find fulfilment while this moustachioed squatter taps on his ribs, churns his bowels and steals his voice.

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Who gives a shit for World Toilet Day?

19/11/2013

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I hope you don’t mind me asking, but have you been to the toilet today? No,
I’m not interested in the condition of your bowels, or whether you put the seat down or washed your hands afterwards, but did you thank the toilet for the service it provided?

No, this isn't another post about pseudo-hallucinations, it’s rather that I’d hate for you to miss out on the World Toilet Day celebrations. Because I’m assuming that, like me, you have a lot to be thankful for in that regard.

I’m thankful that, unlike a third of women worldwide, I don’t have to wander the
streets in the dead of night in search of somewhere safe to empty my bladder.
I’m grateful that my school had toilet and washing facilities, so that I didn’t have to stay at home and jeopardise my education when I began to menstruate.
That I’m not one of the 1.1 billion people around the world who has to shit outside.

I might still grumble when it’s my turn to push the toilet brush down the U bend, but I’m glad that my lifestyle is more akin to Sheena’s than Esme’s in my flash fiction story, Bathroom Suite. That, not only do I have a functioning toilet in my house, I’ve got a spare one for when the main one is busy, and they both sit in rooms that are attractive on the eye. But I hope I’m not as blinkered as Sheena, that I’m doing my humble bit to support those working to bring safe sanitation to all.

For more information on these matters, click on either of the logos. Or listen to this extract from Woman’s Hour, for a reminder of the history of the flushing toilet we’re so lucky to have in the West. Oh, and if you prefer, you can read my story in Hungarian.

Or take the challenge and guess the location of these fabulous toilet facilities – or perhaps you can better it with a favourite of your own. Whatever your toilet-related responses, I promise I won't neglect to say thank you.

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9 fictional psychologists and psychological therapists: 4. Regeneration by Pat Barker

11/11/2013

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Regeneration commences Pat Barker’s lauded First World War trilogy, dramatising a real-life encounter between the poet Siegfried Sassoon and WHR Rivers, an anthropologist, neurologist and psychologist working with shell-shocked soldiers at Craiglockhart Hospital. In July 1917, Sassoon, an army officer, has published a declaration on the injustice of the continuance of the war and is refusing to return to the front. Partly to avoid the negative publicity that might arise from his being court-martialled – and presumably shot – for disobeying an order, he is sent to Rivers for treatment. Over the ensuing months, both men come to change their positions in relation to the Declaration and their respective roles in the conduct of the war. In a parallel process over 250 pages, readers are challenged to consider their positions, not only in relation to war, but also about the ethics of psychological and psychiatric intervention that stifles protest by enabling people to function in an insane world.

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Whose story is it anyway?

4/11/2013

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I’m not someone who goes out armed with a notebook and pencil, ready to snatch snippets of dialogue from an innocent public. It’s not so much, that like Chimamanda Ngozi Adiche, I’ve had people challenge the real-life stuff as unbelievable, or that I’d draw the line at stealing for the sake of my art.

It’s not even that, with repetitive strain injury, I’m one of those writers who (physically) doesn’t write if she can help it. It’s more that, as my head’s already crammed with other people’s stories, I tend not to go searching for more. But sometimes a story is offered to me on a plate (if you read the story, you’ll see how apt is the cliché), and I feel I’ve no choice but to take it, which is exactly what’s happened with Peace-and-Quiet Pancake, just published on the website Flash Fiction Online.

I'm always pleased when my work finds a good home, but this feels extra special because I’m actually being paid for it (very rare for short stories on the web). Now, this post is about ethics, but I'm not asking you to advise me on whether to declare this small amount of income on my tax return. (I'm not at all ambivalent about paying tax, just what it's spent on.) My discomfort relates to whether the story is genuinely mine to sell.

Don't get me wrong. I wrote the words and assembled them in the right order. I devised the plot and structure, such as it is. But the content, the central event isn't entirely fictional and, what's more, while I was present as it happened, it didn't happen to me. So in a sense, it's the little girl's story not mine.

Do other writers worry about things like this?

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