Odd Times by Warren Bull
Today in Christchurch the weather
was cold and dreary. My wife spent the day preparing for the class she is
teaching. I had no particular plans. The prospect of wandering through the
Canterbury University campus or the neighborhoods to see emerging flowers was
not appealing.
After some purposeless activities,
I sat down and reconstructed a short story that somehow got lost. I think the
computer ate it. I wrote it for an anthology that I expected, but it never came
into being. I have started and stopped the recovery effort a number of times
with quite limited success. So that was how I spent a satisfying and useful
day.
I was reminded of the time when I
was traveling with my mother and our flight got delayed for six hours. We were
in the airport where we could take care of necessities as they occurred. With
nothing planned I wrote a short story by analyzing and then stealing some of
the techniques of Iain Pears, who wrote an absolutely great novel, An
Instance of the Fingerpost. It was unlike anything I’ve written before or
after. It was a challenge I had set for myself before and was never able to
meet until then.
I am not going to share my analysis.
It wasn’t based on that novel anyway but on two other wonderful novels of his.
Grab a couple of his novels, take six hours and figure it out for yourself, if
you like.
My point is that being a writer
allows me to take advantage of unexpectedly free periods of time when I might
be bored or think about what I can learn from my failures or ponder the meaning
of life. I find that, although I can squeeze writing into brief interludes, I
like to have enough time to thoroughly work on a project that does not resolve
itself easily. Years ago I wrote
my dissertation in large chunks of time. There are advantages to being
somewhere where you are basically unknown and uninterrupted.
What situations help you write?
I have a couple of ghost stories like that. I see signs of them everywhere but can't find the actual manuscript. In the one I am trying to retrieve now, I can't for the life of me remember who the murderer was. That sort of holds up the rewrite.
ReplyDeleteGood luck with yours.
It's always good to take time to reflect. That is one of the luxuries of being a writer. I also like to read each day, sometimes books I want to reread, but mostly new work.
ReplyDeleteI crave silence, except for the rumble of laundry equipment or the dishwasher. Too much domestic drama to concentrate this week (we were told we need a new furnace asap and our second opinion said we're fine). Until yesterday, when I was able to pound the keyboard for six hours straight. Bliss.
ReplyDeleteWarren, I love free periods to write with no interruptions or other things I need to do. I find I can only write in my library/dining room/office surrounded by books and papers. Too much has been going on for the past three or four weeks, but I'm hoping next week I can get back to working on my current book.
ReplyDeleteI crave silence, and writing time, and reading time every day. I think those are truly my three basic food groups! That said, I couldn't write in an airport, train station, waiting room...I'm too busy people watching. Always so many wonderful details going by that won't be remembered if I don't surreptitiously photograph, or dictate, or write down.
ReplyDeleteWhen i'm given free time (like when we were stuck in Heathrow Airport for over a day--but they kept saying we'd be updated in two hours, so we couldn't leave the airport, even though we had friends who lived nearby) I can never actually write.
ReplyDeleteBut I do start spinning stories in my head, using the people around as possible characters. I'm usually the protagonist, though, and these poor, inccent people are often cast as vile antagonists.
KB--I mean to add, I learned the hard way about losing stories. So now I have a file on my computer with unfinished (or in need of revision) stories, and while I may have to dredge through them if I forgot what I used for a working title, I can find the blasted thing.
ReplyDeleteAnd if you can't remember who the murderer was, is it possible you were wrong about it in the first place? I have written a few things and then realized I've been duped into thinking the wrong character was the villain.
Hi, Warren! I love those moments when something goes bing! in my head and I scramble for anything to remember and if time permits, continue. It's so much fun and I get a story!
ReplyDelete