On Not Writing

I have been in a writing slump for months. When I say slump, what I actually mean is that I simply have not been writing. Call it writer's block, post hand in malaise, whatever - but the truth is that for many writers this kind of writing desert fills us with fear and panic. 

Mine started after I had sent the almost final version of my MS to my publisher - it was fine to begin with - well, not fine but expected. Then in May I fell over and banged the back of my head. I was not knocked out, I didn't break anything (I've had a head scan). But what it has done is left me with a thing called post concussion syndrome - something I knew nothing about before but is, apparently, quite common. There are some physical effects - scalp pain, headaches etc, but by far the worst thing (for me) has been the way that it has effected my critical and creative thinking. I was literally unable to put together new courses or write book reviews. I could critique single poems, but I couldn't hold a whole pamphlet or collection in my head. 

Of course this has had a knock-on effect on my earning ability as I had been planning to write and then run a new email course in September or October and I wasn't able to do that - and as most freelancers can tell you - losing that momentum in the freelance world can cost you customers long term. When I put out feelers on my social media accounts recently about potentially running a new email course, I had not a single enquiry. I can only assume that the lack of activity has affected the algorithms so that my posts are less seen, or that my prolonged absence has meant my potential clients have moved on and found other tutors to fill the hole.

Anyway, this post is not really about that. Luckily my symptoms are (very slowly) improving and during the Christmas break (after a couple of weeks of getting back to morning pages) I have even written one or two (fairly awful) poems. My biggest worry now is that perhaps everything I write post head-injury might be trite rubbish, but I have to trust that slowly and with regular practice that the skills will come back. One of the things I had been looking forward to was The January Writing Hours with Kim Moore and Clare Shaw. What is brilliant is that they operate a pay what you can system for people (like me) who are down on their luck. For anyone unfamiliar with the format - they run a one hour writing workshop each morning in January where they share poems and offer prompts. It's become very popular, with almost 300 participants this year. Today was day five and while not all the prompts have inspired me, some of them really have. And most importantly I am writing, I am moving the pen across the page, and I am finding things to write about.

So what is it I am trying to say here - probably not to despair if you hit a writing slump or setback - even if it goes on for months. Perhaps cut yourself a little slack to begin with - sometimes we just need a break - especially when life is super stressful or busy, or like me something medical gets in the way. Keep reading though, even if it's just the odd poem. I did keep reading when I was able and I am sure this has helped. Eventually a poem might speak to you or inspire you and send you back to the page. And maybe a workshop (Verve Poetry Festival runs a great and affordable online workshop series) or something like the January Writing Hours will help. (I can also offer single lessons which contain links to poems to read and prompts on a variety of different subjects - contact me through my website https://juliawebb.org/ or on social media for details).

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Writerly Preoccupations

When I was batting around ideas for a workshop one of the exercises I came up with was getting the participants to look at what preoccupies them as a writer - what interests them and inspires them, what themes they keep coming back to. As always I did the exercise myself to see what happened and it turned out to be a really useful and productive thing to do. 

You might want to try it - think about what interests you as a writer or artist? What are your preoccupations? What subjects or themes interest you? What things do you find yourself coming back to? Don't just limit yourself to things you have written about - I am interested in many different things that directly, but sometimes indirectly into my work. I found I learnt things about myself by doing this exercise.

Here are mine:

Human relationships place; the intersection between the human world, the natural world and the mystical realm; how events changes us - especially loss and grief; family dynamics; how place affects us and/or shapes us; psychology and counselling; music and lyrics; the past and how we repeat behaviour patterns; cruelty and violence (and the reasons for it); myth and fairytale; parallel universes; a Utopian future; the disintegration of a caring democratic society; repetition and internal rhyme; other worlds; art house film; stories where the ending is ambiguous or left open; other species; where wildness encroaches on order; edges and borders; otherness; the the physical body (and how it ages); being a parent - and how that changes over time; loss and grief; the stories and lies we tell ourselves (and others); memory; collective memory; the way memory changes over time; trauma and how its passed down through families.

Never simply the bird (some thoughts on what poetry does)

Poetry is that thing that happens between seeing the bird (or hearing the bird) and recognising the bird. It helps us to recognise the bird – but more than that – it helps us to understand the bird in some way, or to think about the bird (that ordinary bird that you see everyday on your street or in your garden) in new and different ways. Poetry adds meaning to the bird (or cat or house or whatever). Sometimes it puts the bird in a context we might never have expected, or it takes that ordinary common garden bird and shows us how extraordinary it is, and somehow it simultaneously tells us something about ourselves or about (human) life, love, meaning etc. The poet may not have set out to intentionally do this. He/she may simply have set out to write a poem about the bird or to write about the place that he/she always sees the bird, or about how the bird makes him/her feel. But that’s the beauty of (good) poetry – it does something secret, something other, it’s where the magic happens. Good poetry moves and changes the reader; it shows us new ways to put words together, it gives us new ways to feel and view the world, or it reveals to us something about ourselves and our own personal connection with the world.

Reading and Writing

In the last few days I have found myself trying to analyse how (and if) my reading patterns affect my writing. I have written very little poetry in the past couple of months, and while it's true that this might have a direct correlation with certain events that have occurred in my life recently, I found myself also wondering if it is to do with what, and how much, I am reading.

I know for instance that I write more poetry if I am reading poetry - but not just any poetry, it has to be something really inspiring. In fact some poetry collections are so inspiring that they send me running for my pencil an notebook. It is like some kind of weird alchemy - I don't know how it works but it does - in the same way that morning pages can up my creativity levels. I have been reading poetry though, and quite a bit, but none of it has really given me that poetry high that makes me want to write. The last two collections that did that were "Raptors" by Toon Tellegan and "Autobiography of Red" by Ann Carson. Nothing I have read over the summer has come close to them sadly.

The other thing is that I have been reading a lot of fiction - both novels and short stories. I am reading more than usual because I am in the Summer Reads reading circle, but I am reading other books as well those. I don' t know if reading a lot of fiction stops me writing poetry, or if I am choosing to read a lot of fiction as some sort of escapism from real life. I know that when I went through a prolific poetry phase last year I was hardly reading any fiction at all, but that could just be coincidental of course.

Walking the Line

Finding the work/writing balance is something that many writers have written about and for many of us it continues to be a struggle. It can be especially hard when your paid work uses up much of your creative energy. I am in just such a predicament at the moment; trying to balance copy writing, teaching and other freelance work alongside finishing my poetry collection and trying to generate new work. It's not easy I can tell you. At the moment paid work is winning the battle.  I know this has to change though - I am not happy when I am not working on my writing.

Things that stop you writing

Writing and editing are slow at the moment. I have lots of good excuses for this - I am too busy, my work space has been suffering a plague of noise from the builders across the road, I am lacking in inspiration, worry about money, trying to find work, needing to go on a trip etc. The truth is that they are all true and none of them are. I am indeed suffering from being busy and lack of inspiration - but what exactly is it that makes us write? And what is it that at other times brings the creative process to a grinding halt. It is all to easy to blame outside factors but as any good Zen master would tell you peace and creativity come from within. When I am stressing about money, work or noise it is because I am choosing to hear those niggly worrying voices inside me over the calmer more creative ones. This is probably why many people take up meditation (and I have lots of good reasons for not doing that either!) it can put you in touch with that calmer part of your psyche.

I am feeling like I need to make a real effort to claim back my creative life from all the other things that I am allowing to encroach on it. Wish me luck...

A Bit About Inspiration

I have been trying to observe my writing habits this week. I already know that I write much more if I write my morning pages regularly but this week I have also noticed that a catalyst to writing (or a change to writing style) can be a change of notebook.

Earlier on this year I went to a poetry workshop at Writers' Centre Norwich with John Mcauliffe and he talked about how his poetry writing was affected by the size of notebook he chose to write in. He said that he had started taking a bigger notebook out with him so that his writing was less limited and had longer lines. I had never really paid attention to this before and have experimented with varying the size of book I take out - although for convenience I do normally end up with quite a small one.

What I noticed this week, however, was that my writing became more sparky when I started writing in a new notebook. I always have several notebooks on the go - my writing is messy I guess, a bit like me, I generally have a large notebook (A4) that I use for morning pages and writing at home and one or two smaller ones that I carry around for writing in when I am out. I also try and buy notebooks that are quite attractive - it seems to help my creative process somehow to have an inspiring notebook, so it's great when I get given them as presents - they may stay on a shelf for ages but I always use them eventually. This week I noticed a book that had been sitting unused on my piano for quite some time, it had been given to me as a present over a year ago and for some reason the time had never been right to use it. Yesterday, however, I picked it up and opened it and the ideas just started to flow. It was a little like having a change of scene but without having to go anywhere.

The other thing that is nearly always guaranteed to trigger writing for me if I am feeling creatively constipated is reading.  If you don't read other poets you can't be a good poet yourself - I really believe it as simple as that! It would be a bit like trying to create art without ever having seen any art or knowing what art is. For me it is a vital part of the creative process. I do, like anyone else, have those times where I try to read book after book and nothing inspires me and in those times I usually turn to the few favouritess that I go back to again and again. I have a whole host of favourite poetry books, but there seem to certain ones that galvanise me into wanting to write more than others - I'm not sure why those books in particular - it must be something about the voice or the writing style. Two such books are Budapest to Babel by Agnes Lehoczky and Like Something Flying Backwards by C.D. Wright.

Escaping the Thought Rut

I seem to be a bit immobilized at the moment by weather and health but I am trying to make the most of it by reading and working my way through a book called How to Write a Poem by John Redmond. It might seem like quite a basic title but actually I am finding it really useful. The chapter titles are what you would expect from this type of book - basic stuff like "Viewpoint", "Image", "The Question of Voices" etc, but they are well written and each chapter has a writing task at the end related to the chapter that you have just read.

I love this kind of book - I think that however practised a writer you are it doesn't hurt to go back over the basics once in a while.  Sometimes you might learn something new or be reminded of something that you have forgotten. I find the writing exercises really helpful too - anything that takes you out of your own thinking rut (and we all have one) has got to be good and occasionally they have inspired a really good poem that I may not have otherwise written.

Evolution, Research and the Creative Process

David Hockney on the Southbank Show tonight said that most of his work is research and he articulated exactly what I feel about my own work. Maybe it comes from being a perpetual student and my thirst for learning or maybe it is just the natural evolutionary process of creation but I always feel that whatever I am doing is just a small step along the path to something else, perhaps something bigger and better, perhaps just something different. It is certainly true that my work has evolved over the past few years and I am often pleased and surprised by the new turns it takes.

I also think that as time has gone on I have wanted to do more research around my subjects matters - so that as well as writing from direct experience of the countryside I find that I am now wanting to read books about how the landscape has been shaped. The only trouble is that there is not enough time to read about all the things that I am interested in!