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Wednesday, June 15, 2011

Thoughts on Writer's Block, Cheese Bunnies, and Ambiguity

My various projects suffer from a great deal of writer's block. My blog, along with both my current novels and just any short story ideas that pop into my head.

Some of it has to do with the fact that I get the feeling that if I start working on anything, I'll hate how it is and it'll join all the other files currently in my "In the Works" folder. Sure, revising and editing are for making things better. But if I'm not in "the mood" or "in the zone" then I shouldn't write anything. Most of the time, I really end up disliking it. I have to be completely consumed by an idea and have it pretty well planned out on paper or in my head before I'm willing to stake a significant amount of time on it and make it the best.

So writer's block unfortunately strikes me a few times a year:
--A month after WriMo, when I've put my story to rest for a time to mull over ideas. Generally I don't pick it up again for quite some time....
--After several days/weeks of writing a short story or even flash fiction consistently.
--Working on a previous WriMo novel and making major changes to it that are for the better, but ultimately, I'm lazy.
--Undecisive-ness in searching for the right direction to take my short story/novella/novel, etc.
--Editing and revising large bodies of work.

Hopefully I can find a cure soon. This requires epic music, me thinks.

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An organic snack food company, Annie's, makes some really awesome crackers and grahams. They're in the shape of bunnies, since that is their mascot.

I'm not a fan of bunnies, so the idea of consuming them is really amusing to me. Despite the chocolate chip, chocolate, and honey graham bunnies being great, I have to say, the cheese bunnies are super delicious. They're like goldfish, and we know how irresistible those can be.

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I'm not sure if I've talked about this before - and a Google search has proved I haven't - but I never realised how much I love being ambiguous.

I think a lot of it has to do with writers always feeling the need to describe their characters. JK Rowling - although it suited her - described her protagonist to a "T," so we really knew who to envision. The same goes for Stephanie Meyer, and plenty of other authors (although that title to Meyer is generous in my opinion). But they have to describe every aspect of a character. It makes me feel like all they do is sit with Thesaurus.com open on their laptop and see what they could come up with to distinguish one voice from another.

But is that really writing? If you take away all aspects of imagination for your reader by filling their head with descriptions of your character, even down to their eyelashes, or the way their hair falls?

I noticed that in a lot of my stories, I don't describe a character's hair color, or mention anything about their genetic appearance. If anything, I'll perhaps describe their clothes, or the simple fact that their hair is in a ponytail. If a character has a weird tic, then that will make it into the story too. But I want my readers to be able to imagine whoever they want as the protagonist. Perhaps one of my characters takes the shape of Matt Damon in their head. By all means, that's cool with me. I'm not the type to wrangle people into my box of how I see things.

There's freedom in being able to imagine a character just by how they're described via the clothes they wear or how they carry themselves. Personality and habits play a bigger role into humans than just their basic appearance of blonde hair and blue eyes. So does their history and relationships. But should physical characteristics really tie a character down? Perhaps it makes casting easier for the "future movie deal" every writer dreams of....

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