On Creativity and Creative Slumps
May. 14th, 2008 08:07 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
sakon76A friend told me the other day that my translations have gone down in quality and posited that I've lost interest in the project. After some thinking and connecting things in my head, I've come to the conclusion that my problem is not so much a lack of interest in translating, but the fact that my creativity, period, seems to've vanished. I haven't sewn in months except to do up a couple tanktops that I can wear to work. My embroidery has similarly gone *poof!*; I stitched a few lazy daisy stitches while in classes at Costume Con, and that's it. Reading... well, note that of my last four book reviews, three were non-fiction, and the fourth I admit to reading and finishing months ago. As for writing, I petered out a month and a half ago.
But K-chan, you say disputingly, what about that last chapter of Twin Terrors? To which I reply, I have two writing styles. One is actual creative writing where I am one with the muse and she is one with me. This tends to create things like "Splinters" and "Cow Tipping" and "Ghost Stories"... works which just groove and need minimal (if any) editing. For the other style of writing, I borrow (and misuse) a term from P.N. Elrod: B.I.C. writing. Butt In the Chair. I can do it. I can pound out two thousand words in an evening. It's just mechanical and not as good. I'm still not happy with Twin Terrors 7. And I'm similarly not happy with the translating I've been doing.
The problem is, once you get in a creative slump, how do you get out?
I don't know. One of the sage pieces of advice you get in writing classes (other than "show not tell" and similarly worthy pieces) is to read. See what others are doing; see where you would write differently. Let the creativity of others spark your own. Now given that I read a good bit of fanfic (and generally only the stuff I actually consider good), you'd think that I have that one covered. But on the other hand, maybe not. I don't tend to argue with fanfic authors or scoff at them as much. I think this is because fanfic has an established advantage over original fiction: the author and the audience (theoretically) know the field equally well. There's not as much worldbuilding and character introduction going on. Which is why I've started going through my backlog of novels this week. Should I consider it a bad sign that the two I've finished both have flaws from my PoV? And so did the last one I reviewed? I have a rule where I don't count manga as books to be reviewed; not that the authors put less work into them--far from it--but because my focus is on the written descriptive word. Manga is more like a script or a film for me; you get dialogue and pictures and facial expressions, so it really is a different beast than a novel, which happens solely in the theatre of the mind.
So, in short, expect a lot of novel reviews from me as I attempt to get my creativity back, and hopefully some stories too. Because while I'm not actively depressed... it would be nice to have my groove back.
But K-chan, you say disputingly, what about that last chapter of Twin Terrors? To which I reply, I have two writing styles. One is actual creative writing where I am one with the muse and she is one with me. This tends to create things like "Splinters" and "Cow Tipping" and "Ghost Stories"... works which just groove and need minimal (if any) editing. For the other style of writing, I borrow (and misuse) a term from P.N. Elrod: B.I.C. writing. Butt In the Chair. I can do it. I can pound out two thousand words in an evening. It's just mechanical and not as good. I'm still not happy with Twin Terrors 7. And I'm similarly not happy with the translating I've been doing.
The problem is, once you get in a creative slump, how do you get out?
I don't know. One of the sage pieces of advice you get in writing classes (other than "show not tell" and similarly worthy pieces) is to read. See what others are doing; see where you would write differently. Let the creativity of others spark your own. Now given that I read a good bit of fanfic (and generally only the stuff I actually consider good), you'd think that I have that one covered. But on the other hand, maybe not. I don't tend to argue with fanfic authors or scoff at them as much. I think this is because fanfic has an established advantage over original fiction: the author and the audience (theoretically) know the field equally well. There's not as much worldbuilding and character introduction going on. Which is why I've started going through my backlog of novels this week. Should I consider it a bad sign that the two I've finished both have flaws from my PoV? And so did the last one I reviewed? I have a rule where I don't count manga as books to be reviewed; not that the authors put less work into them--far from it--but because my focus is on the written descriptive word. Manga is more like a script or a film for me; you get dialogue and pictures and facial expressions, so it really is a different beast than a novel, which happens solely in the theatre of the mind.
So, in short, expect a lot of novel reviews from me as I attempt to get my creativity back, and hopefully some stories too. Because while I'm not actively depressed... it would be nice to have my groove back.
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Date: 2008-05-15 10:33 pm (UTC)I found this an interesting philosophical musing on the idea of creativity. I read voraciously and I have since I learned to read. However, I also suffered from Dysthemia (long term depression) for almost six years and writing is one of the tools I use now to keep depression at bay. It's only been recently that I felt what I was doing was good enough to put out for the world to see.
But one of the exercises my husband helped me with while I was depressed was a variation on the song meme. He threw out a word, and I wrote whatever I wanted for as long as I wanted. Stream-of-consciousness writing for the most part, but interesting. Once I stopped for more than thirty seconds, he'd give me another word and I'd be off again.
The very nice thing about this exercise was that I wasn't trying to tell a story or make it pretty or anything like that, and my husband would mix up innocuous words with hot-button words and I could rant and rave to my heart's content and get the poison of depression out of my system.
When I went back to work, I subscribed to a word-of-the-day site and used that word to continue the therapy, so to speak. Now I don't need this tool, but I keep it in mind for when I am in a funk.
I don't know if this is tl;dr or boring as heck or just not interesting, but...I really enjoy your stories and wanted to offer a tool that I haven't found to be common but which is useful.