Writer's Block.

[Atheist]

Anyone here had writer's block? I know you won't be able to give me a prescription to get over it, but maybe some advice to come to terms?

[Buenchico]

The web is full of advice on the subject (from people who didn't seem to suffer much from writer's block when pontificating about it!). e.g. https://blog.reedsy.com/writers-block/

This, from Random House publishing, might be worth a look:
https://authornews.penguinrandomhouse.com/10-ways-to-beat-writers-block/

My own hard drive is littered with partly-completed works, which I keep telling myself I'll finish one day. (The children's novel is about 80% complete, whereas the radio play still has a long way to go. The countless poems all just need 'tidying up a bit' - being something of a perfectionist doesn't help much when it comes to trying to overcome writer's block!)

I keep coming across newspaper articles that I wrote many years ago, which prove that I can write well when given a deadline. I sometimes try to work to self-imposed deadlines these days, to simulate writing for the press again, but, alas, I seem to lack the self-discipline to do so!

[woofgang]

Not quite the same but Robert Jordan once said, when asked where his insiration came from "I don't know where it comes from but I know where it goes to. It goes to my desk. And if I am not there waiting for it it goes away again"

I, too have written most of a novel. I did keep getting it out and trying again then I realised that I hadn't written it for publicagtion but because I needed to get certain things out of my brain and onto paper. Once I had done that, like Dorothy Sayers says " In the meanwhile she had got her mood on to paper – and this is the release that all writers, even the feeblest, seek for as men seek for love; and, having found it, they doze off happily into dreams and trouble their heads no further."

Sayers, Dorothy L.. Gaudy Night: Lord Peter Wimsey Book 12 (Lord Peter Wimsey Series) (p. 270). Hodder & Stoughton. Kindle Edition.

[Atheist]

Thank you, Buen. I've never been a professional writer like you, and so I am stuck in a place where I feel that I can only write what I believe in. That's lovely, but not conducive to producing 'stuff', which is what writers really need to do. Thanks again; I'll find my way through - it's really only a few plot turns away and then I'll start churning out the product. You must see from my clumsy prose that I'm not at the top of my form. Who did you write for?

[Buenchico]

I've only ever written part-time for the press, Atheist. I started writing sports reports for the local rag at the age of fourteen and just sort of progressed from there!

[Atheist]

Thank you too, Woof. If you have written most of a novel, why have you not written a whole novel?

[woofgang]

as I said, I didn't need to :)

[Peter Pedant]

// but because I needed to get certain things out of my brain and onto paper//

I have only once done that - it worked quite well
I felt better but of course I cd have felt better without - I dont know

the only problem was - - - "what you are writing will harm your career". oo-er Mrs well it was 40 y ago
how many times have I heard that when it is really
"what you are writing will harm MY career"

[Peter Pedant]

No matter how ghastly I make the pastiche
the person I base it on - seems to recognise it

[Ellipsis]

To get ideas, a good long walk away from traffic.

For concentration, binaural beats.

[woofgang]

yeah been there, it was an email :) fun fun fun

[Atheist]

Thanks to you all. It's nice to know that there is intelligent life out there.

[jourdain2]

I've had it for almost a year!!!! I've been writing short stories for some years - have a couple in small press and others to download to Kindle on Amazon (no-one seems too interested!). Then OH said 'You can write a novel." Panic set in and everything stopped, no matter how long I sat at the keyboard. I'm 1 chapter into it and have some ideas, but am almost terminally daunted.

I am hoping that the Sat. Tel. may have come to my rescue. They are running a writing comp for short stories with 'lockdown' as a theme and I have managed to get started (max. 1,000 words). I certainly shan't win, or even be placed, but it has started me writing again and I am over 200 words into it. Just come onto AB after doing a bit of research.

Advice? I haven't really got any except that experience shows that the harder you try the further away go the words, so try to relax. If you are on with a novel, how about trying a short story or a vignette - or almost anything creative with words, just to get going? Hope this helps a bit. :)

[jourdain2]

^^^ P.S. I do keep going with writing snippets for local press about village events etc..

[woofgang]

When i kicked off my novel what wasn't I did NaNoWriMo which was fun. I got my badge too! https://nanowrimo.org

[Ken4155]

As i have said before, i have written a 120,000 word novel, of which, at irregular intervals, i send half a dozen chapters or so to publishers; nothing but rejection slips so far (7 in total). I found the best way for me to avoid writer's block was to write in longhand until i had run out of ideas. Then type what i had written and, as i was doing this, more ideas would come to me. So i would cease typing and go back to writing longhand. Probably wouldn't work for everyone, but it certainly worked for me.

[jourdain2]

Ken - remember James Herriot and his hundreds of rejection slips. It is hard, I know from experience.

[Ken4155]

My inspiration is Stephen King, Jourdain. His 'Carrie' was rejected 30 times! One publisher said to King, "We are not interested in science fiction that deals with negative utopias. They do not sell." And the rest, as they say, is history :-)

[jno]

have you actually started yet, or are you staring at a blank sheet of paper while the plot revolves in your mind?

[Ken4155]

I must admit that during the process i mentioned earlier, when i came to type up what i had written, i often found that i had no memory of actually writing certain passages. It was almost as of the book were writing itself, at times, and leading me down paths i hadn't envisaged. I come of age next year (66) when i will make the decision on whether or not to hang up my paint brushes and pack away my step ladders. Then i may just blow the dust of the novel, tweak it a tad more and get serious about seeing it in print.

[jno]

King's publishers weren't entirely wrong, Ken, Carrie wasn't a big seller until it came out in paperback for a different publisher.