Issues with creative writing

I have a problem with my more elaborate narrative ideas; unfortunately the course of normal life both at work and at play don’t allow constant direct translation of ideas into text. Furthermore, it is essential that one be in the right mood to write; attempting to force the mood almost always ends up being destructive to the translation process.

For me though there is a greater issue; when I’m really into an idea, it becomes alive and lives in my thoughts constantly. Characters continue their stories, continue to have moments that stand-out as stylised expressions, and before long there are often entire back-stories and rolling events that continue to unfold in my everyday thoughts. This is often the largest element to effect my motivation to write; there is simply too much happening, and writing it all down means slowing the entire process and reviewing things at a snail’s pace.

There are also a few things which can be difficult to translate into text, especially some of the more visual expressions I have. I think there have been times when I’ve succeeded to a larger extent than others, but at I still wonder whether the reader truly sees what I want to show. Sure enough, some of that is interpretive, and as I’ve written several times in the past, most of the time I like to leave as much authorial control with the reader, but there are times when I see specific images and feel compelled to try and translate them.

This isn’t always for stylised moments though. More often than not I see quite mundane things as very important; walking down a street, neutral thoughts and reflections in-between those moments that contain more narrative information, but there a few key issues that are inherent in text that we don’t experience in actual visual mediums, and I’m sure there are a few the other way too. In any case, mundane things such as walking down a street or long moments of staring while sitting somewhere can be expressed perfectly with visual mediums.

The problem with text is that there is always the presence of a narrator – I don’t mean in the sense of whether the piece of literature is written in first or third-person, but the literal fact that everything must be described in language, language that always carries undertones, and indeed overtones, of verbal communication. I feel that a piece of literature is always speaking, and that the everpresent voice of the narration makes any element of stillness extremely difficult to create.

It isn’t impossible, and there have been times when I’ve been satisfied with both things I’ve written and works by others that I’ve read, however there are yet again more factors that have a dramatic effect on how well it can be done. Often if I want to accurately translate stillness or solemnity, I will write for example a character moving about their home doing mundane things, with little comment to their actual thoughts. Interspersed with the descriptions of those actions may be small but sufficient insights into the character’s moods and emotions. To really make the atmosphere immersive for myself, I tend to make these scenes go for some time, but there is the risk of over-stating the point, or perhaps having the reader misunderstand the descriptions of the actions as actually trying to make a dramatic point, rather than creating a subtle but extremely relevant sense of atmosphere. With that sentense there is raised perhaps one of the most difficult elements in literature because of the afore-mentioned presence of the narration; subtlety.

That of-course is a whole entire chapter in itself, and I don’t want to go into it in this entry; readers of this relatively light (extremely light) weight of text will already have lost interest and patience, such is the predominant culture here online; but nevertheless, I always endeavour to constantly make notes on my thoughts and reflections on my own writing…

and also make excuses for why I’m too lazy to write stories.