Good day, readers!
Recently, I had a great fortune to be asked to contribute a short story to a anthology with a theme that is dear to my heart. I’m not trying to vague-boast, but to discuss an ill-advised reaction that occurred as soon as I received the email inquiry.
The first thought that flashed across my mind was a rather urgent, ‘It needs to be good!’ I’d leap-frogged the entire process of conception—impressing the new idea at an awkward first date, all the way through attending its birth—and was already calculating what grades it would need to attend the best colleges.
We’re not even courting, Maura!
Luckily, I grounded my sabotage helicopter before the rotors whirred into action.
I corrected myself: ‘No, it needs to be weird.’
In some ways this advice might seem applicable only to those of use who write strange fiction, but not if you consider the genesis of weird (a favourite word of mine).
c. 1400, "having power to control fate," from wierd (n.), from Old English wyrd "fate, chance, fortune; destiny; the Fates," literally "that which comes," from Proto-Germanic *wurthiz (source also of Old Saxon wurd, Old High German wurt "fate," Old Norse urðr "fate, one of the three Norns"), from PIE *wert- "to turn, to wind," (source also of German werden, Old English weorðan "to become"), from root *wer- (2) "to turn, bend." For the sense development from "turning" to "becoming," compare phrase turn into "become."
I want to stress the section “to turn, bend” and its association with “becoming”.
Ideas are free range entities that require an indulgent observation at the beginning in order to evolve. At best they are shape-changers that under the light of ‘what if’ morph into surprising new beasts. Better still, place several of them into the same mental space and allow them to bounce off each other. That’s when the magic happens.
It’s best to allow them romp about while you wash dishes and stare out the window in a rather puzzled fashion. When do you whip the lasso out and start dragging them in, bucking and trashing? If they resist mightily that might be a problem. If they trot over that can be a good sign, although you don’t want them too tame.
The urge always, is to rope them in quickly. Patience is hard to learn, and unfortunately time is not always on your side. Deadlines loom, and panic sets in. I’ve had the unpleasant situation of having to pass on an opportunity because I just could not get the damn story to behave in time for a deadline.1
In that case the tale finally came to heel a couple of months later and eventually went off to a good home. The creative part of the brain is both mysterious and hackable, but once you realise that every project will require a unique approach, you’ll be better off.
Yet, being too precious about your work is another danger. Despite all I’ve written, the anvil of necessity can produce surprising work because you cannot overthink. One of the best things about this newsletter—or any scheduled output—is you must produce on time. The brain spots the repeated pattern and eventually starts working to help you with the task. If it is a very tight schedule then you learn to get the work done and out. This can be a struggle for the fastidious personality, but learning to ‘let go and move on’ is a useful skill.
Expecting perfection is probably the number one reason ideas remain stunted. That desperate need to impress with a magnum opus every time makes the imagination baulk under the pressure to be brilliant constantly. Over time it can cause the writing muscles to atrophy from anxiety-induced disuse.
This is one of the reasons that writing partnerships can be so successful (notice that comedy writers often work in pairs). You are not dependent upon one imagination to generate ideas. You can toss words back and forth at each other and watch them bounce about in delightful ways. It’s much easier to accelerate growth in a concept with another creative person. It requires trust and a certain egolessness, however. I enjoy collaborative work for the way it twists stories into shapes I could not have envisioned on my own. There is something truly exciting about watching stories improve under the careful stewardship of creative equals.
We don’t always get (or want) that opportunity. Sometimes we are possessed of a hoarder mentality and must hammer our ideas into our singular visions.
That’s when we need to get weird.
I stumbled across the above image while searching for something completely different. It was one of those moments of synchronicity that I’m actively encouraging for my Substack writing. I do have a plan of action for the next six months, but the work has already deviated from it sharply. I encourage ideas to come forward and then give them permission to go where they wish. Thus, I discover new art.
Not only did I find this sculpture arresting, but the impetus behind it also snagged my attention. Richard Hunt created this steel creature back in 1975, as part of the ‘Great Ideas’ project, ‘a program that commissioned artists to interpret the writings of the world’s eminent thinkers.’
Hunt’s sculpture was inspired by the following quote from Nathaniel Hawthorne:
“The greatest obstacle to being heroic is the doubt whether one may not be going to prove one’s self a fool; the truest heroism, is to resist the doubt; and the profoundest wisdom, to know when it ought to be resisted, and when to be obeyed.” – Nathaniel Hawthorne, The Blithedale Romance, 1852
Hunt (1935 - ) has never paid attention to restrictions or boundaries, and his life is incredibly inspiring. Reading his biography will put your creative struggles into perspective, but let’s cut to the summarising final paragraph:
At 86 years old, Hunt has created sculpture for nearly seven decades. During that time, Hunt has received 16 honorary degrees and served on over two dozen boards, committees, and councils, including serving as a Commissioner for the National Museum of American Art, part of the Smithsonian Institution. Hunt has also received more than 30 major awards including the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Fellowship, the Lifetime Achievement Award from the International Sculpture Center, the Fifth Star Award from the City of Chicago, and the Legends and Legacy Award from the Art Institute of Chicago. Richard Hunt, still working from his studio in Chicago’s Lincoln Park neighborhood, is one of our country’s greatest living artists.
Hunt is a working sculptor, who over his long career has created small pieces and very large public artworks. His attitude to his work is that “there is an overarching impulse to accomplish a synthesis of organic and industrial subject matter, hybrid-izing and layering it with a certain amount of ambiguity to open it up and make it thought-provoking.”2
The range of his work is impressive, and they all exhibit a remarkable fluidity despite being static pieces, notable even in his heavier sculptures. I’d encourage anyone to review his extensive portfolio of work. He has created so many pieces for so many organisations, locations, and celebrations that he has learned to be endlessly expressive. Sometimes he works to an assignment and other times he creates as the spirit moves him. No doubt this combination of limits and freedom allows him to keep innovating. I love how he describes his creative space, his glorious studio as, ‘an environment that is full of possibilities.’3
Having a welcoming attitude to ideas, a looseness that can later be tightened as you hone into the good stuff, is a wonderful starting point. Being curious and open can be hard if we over-stress ourselves. Sometimes you’ve got to back off and get a bit of perspective. As important as we view our work, it ain’t curing cancer. It’s okay to strive for your best, yet accept when you are doing decent work.
Keep going! Generate another idea and allow it move you forward. Make it a game to invent different simple scenarios regularly. It's all about training the brain to keep the supply coming. Legendary screenwriter Billy Wilder used to create ‘meet-cutes’ (how the potential lovers in a romantic comedy bump into each other for the first time) and write them in a notebook for when he needed them.4
The Hawthorne quote that inspired Hunt’s 1975 sculpture leaves you plenty to chew upon.
Doubt in your heroic ambition can stem from a fear of proving yourself a fool (i.e. deep down you consider yourself a fool for attempting something bold).
Resisting this doubt allows you to push at your limits.
But as an artist you need enough self-knowledge to realise when you need to rein it back in.
Failure, or more common, a near-miss, is unavoidable if you wish to be creative. Disappointment in your work is the constant companion of the artist. What you must reconcile at some point is that no one knows what your original vision was, and how far you have missed your mark. Many people are going to enjoy the work that you believe is flawed. Never, ever contradict someone who has just praised a piece of your art. A simple ‘Thank you’ is sufficient. Choke off the caveats or dismissals that boil up in your throat. Do not place the burden of your internalised inferiority on your fan’s back.
I know few people who are totally satisfied with all their artistic endeavours. Especially as artists grow and develop and their earlier work may seem either naïve or clunky. To be fair, artists love to grumble about their process and the outside complications that impinge upon their work. Many like to stress that the struggle is real, man.
Dissatisfaction is what stirs us on to try again. Sometimes it can be a hot rage to prove someone wrong, or a steely determination to get it righter.
The classic Samuel Beckett quote is eternally relevant, and succinct: “Ever tried. Ever failed. No matter. Try again. Fail again. Fail better.” (Worstward Ho, 1983)
I also like this quote from Paul Valéry, who wrote in 1933 about his poem, “Le Cimetière marin”:
In the eyes of those who anxiously seek perfection, a work is never truly completed—a word that for them has no sense—but abandoned; and this abandonment, of the book to the fire or to the public, whether due to weariness or to a need to deliver it for publication, is a sort of accident, comparable to the letting-go of an idea that has become so tiring or annoying that one has lost all interest in it.5
Circling back to the beginning, a couple of days after receiving the short story brief my mind served up the core idea after random musings on unconnected subjects. So far it is a glittering seed of potential and I’m allowing it to roll about in the nourishing dirt of my imagination for as long as possible.
How well will it grow, how satisfied will I be with its final shape?
At the moment its potential is perfect.
Until I ruin it.
And then, hopefully, reforge it.
Keep it weird, folks!
Regarding my weirder stories, I like to point people towards ‘Water’, a flash fiction that was published in Black Static, reprinted in my collection The Boughs Withered, and can be read on my website. This story emptied out of my brain in one go, and it’s a rare piece that I don’t mind re-reading.
There’s a whole other topic to discuss here about the different rates at which writers write, which I won’t get into today. Let’s just say that ‘output comparing’ is unhelpful.
‘Richard Hunt: Freeing the Human Soul’, interview with Jan Garden Castro, May 1, 1998 for Sculpture.
‘Billy Wilder, The Art of Screenwriting No. 1’, interviewed by James Linville. The Paris Review, Issue 138, Spring 1996.
Translated by Rosalie Maggio.
What a brilliant post! So many gems here, especially around the subject of bravery and failure. Just what I needed to read today! Thank you!