Feeling stuck?
Join the club
Hello and welcome to the latest issue of Fervent Curiosity. My name is Victor De Anda and this is my newsletter.
If you’re a writer and you’re reading this, you know the feeling, right? You sit down with the page, ready to write the next epic tale of love and revenge…and then nothing comes out. How do you deal with it? I usually force myself to crank out some words, even if they’re shitty ones. A page full of crap looks better than an empty one to me. Let’s discuss.
Morning pages
What are morning pages? Writer Julia Cameron created the idea in her book THE ARTIST’S WAY. It’s a daily stream-of-consciousness writing exercise intended to get the creative juices flowing before you dig into your main project.
For me, it’s a chance to warm up and keep my handwriting muscles in shape. I typically write my morning pages in longhand with a fountain pen. What do I write about? Whatever’s on my mind, that’s what. It doesn’t matter. No one’s going to read it anyways.
Around four or five years ago, I read an interview with Neil Gaiman where he talked about doing all his drafting in longhand with a fountain pen. A fountain pen?? I’d written stories in longhand before, hell, I even wrote an entire screenplay in longhand on legal pads. I probably won’t do that again. But I’ve written plenty of things by hand. Things like journal entries, and my morning pages.
Unless I handwrite regularly, my muscle memory fades away. There are times when I get back to writing by hand after a long break, and it feels super awkward. Like trying to steer a fire engine from the rear compartment—strange. Eventually, my hand gets used to holding the pen and forming somewhat legible letters. Writing with a fountain pen is an acquired skill too, it took me a while to learn the right angle and grip to produce the best inflow.
I digress. So, morning pages are what I do to unstick myself before the real writing begins. Does it work all the time? No. What it does do is get me in the mindset that not every word I write is precious, which is important, at least in the beginning. I was also a journalist in high school and college, which helps reduce my attachment to words the first time around, I think. So don’t get attached to your words. They can be revised, shaped, molded.
Shitty first drafts or revise as you go?
In her seminal writing craft book BIRD BY BIRD, Anne Lamott talks about her belief in the “vomit draft,” or “shitty first draft.” In other words, just pushing out words, getting them down on paper or on the screen with no regards to their quality. A page of bad words is easier to edit than a blank page.
When writing the first draft of a story, I do try to get through it as fast as possible. But sometimes, I just can’t. I want to make each sentence a good one before I move forward. In my early days as a fiction writer, I would often get bogged down in a story this way and never finish. I was so consumed with making the first page sing, that I never completed anything. I’ve got a graveyard folder of incomplete stories like this. One day, I’ll get back to them and finish them. One day.
Zadie Smith has said that she works on the first paragraph of any story or novel until the voice sounds true to her. That means revising and polishing until those first sentences shine. Once she gets the voice right, the rest of the piece flows better for her.
Other writers like Joe R. Lansdale revise as they create their first draft and never go back. With each new day’s writing, he looks over what has been written before and revises it. This way, when he completes a first draft, it’s not really that, but a series of constant revisions.
These two methods of beating the blank page are just a few of the tools you have at your disposal as a writer.
Take in other art to unblock you
When I’m stuck and nothing’s working, I’ll often do something else entirely. Watch a movie, read a book. Listen to music. I’m a big music person and often find inspiration just listening to things I’ve haven’t heard in a while. I think it was Stephen King who said when the writing’s not going well, try reading. Oftentimes, reading good stuff will inspire you to get back to the page. I’m paraphrasing this King quote, so sue me if I got it wrong.
Whatever works for you
To get unstuck, I’ve tried each of these methods with varying degrees of success. And I keep trying others, like pulling an exercise from THE BOOK OF SURREALIST GAMES, or any number of writing prompts out there on the web. There’s no “one size fits all” way to help you start when the writing’s stopped coming.
All I can suggest is to keep trying different things until you find the method that works best for you. There’s plenty more that’s been written on this subject, but I’ve got to finish this piece, so I’m going to leave you with some great quotes instead.
“The first draft of anything is shit.” —Ernest Hemingway
“The first draft is just you telling yourself the story.”—Terry Pratchett
“Every first draft is PERFECT because all a first draft has to do is exist.”—Jane Smiley
“First you make it, then you make it good.”—Jordan Harper
What happens when you’ve gotten unstuck and written something, but it just doesn’t work? That’s a whole different story, and one that M.E. Proctor addresses in her excellent post here. Check it out!
How do you get the words flowing when you’re stuck?
What I’m Reading:
I put down POP. 1280 by Jim Thompson a while ago and now I’m picking it back up again. I’ve taken to reading 4-5 books at a time now, leaving one when it slows down and coming back to it later. Not sure if it’s the best way to read a book, but that’s what I do.
What I’m Writing:
Still working on a horror piece for a submission call. I’m currently stuck on it, so I may try some unsticking methods to help kickstart it again.
This month is a first for me in terms of publishing. I’ve got 3 stories coming out. Crazy, right? My story “Ahuizotl” will appear in the Dark Waters Vol. 2 anthology (out on Dec 20), I’ve got a flash piece “Frank is typing…” out at Roi Faineant here, and finally, my Arctic thriller story “Diamond Dust” is out now at Yellow Mama here.
What I’m Watching:
Just rewatched IN BRUGES, what a film. Outstanding performances by Colin Farrell, Brendan Gleeson, and Ralph Fiennes. Just as great as the first time I saw it in the theater. I’d forgotten how hard it goes. Great crime film with equal quantities of humor and pathos.
That about does it for this week. If you liked this, please give me a mention or share it on social media. You can find all my links here.
Thanks for reading and I’ll see you next time.
Definitely not alone in that predicaments! Actually, I'm writing about something similar on my post next Thursday... sort of. I'm glad you're not going exactly where I'm going otherwise I would have to rewrite the entire thing, bummer. But we're good! When I'm really stuck, I turn back to the past. I have the character of Tom Keegan, a homicide cop in 1950 San Francisco that always gets my brain going. I go online and look at old pictures, old newspaper headlines, and such, and bingo something pops into my head. Something worth working on. That guy is my savior, no kidding!