Creativity Other Ways

Of course writers of fiction are creative.  They use their imagination to inhabit and people other worlds.  But they also write what they know. I’ve often found imagination pushes what I know. I discover things I didn’t realise I already knew by engaging the imagination. But does that creativity spill out and appear elsewhere? And are we in fact being more creative in other areas than even in our writing?

Parallels between teaching and writing

For twenty-six years I was a secondary school teacher. Days during term time included five to six hours contact time with students and then two to three hours marking and preparation. Preparation was a joy. It was relaxation at the end of a busy day, it was preparing for the future and it offered hope.  Perhaps they would understand and even enjoy what I was offering. Or better still they would be inspired, then motivated and in fact would direct their own learning.

Writing and teaching share a cycle of action research. You plan something and then you try it out. If it works you build on it. If it doesn’t, you adapt, teach again and then revaluate, planning again if need be.  

I often tell my creative writing students that teaching and writing is actually a difficult combination until you become a competent and confidant enough teacher to be able to switch off at weekends and in the school holidays. Teaching saps much of your creative energy.

That said, I did start my MA in Writing for Children whilst I was head of Modern Languages at a demanding comprehensive school. So, anything is possible I suppose.  

 

Working with prompts

I’ve always enjoyed this and have come up with some very pleasing work in response to random prompts.  I now build this into my writing routine. After an edit of my novel I’ll write a short story based on one of the prompts from my Prompts book. And I also have a go every so often at submitting something to a “Themed” call for submission.  Just to show that I can.

In fact the Prompts book is based on prompts. I invite other writers to provide them but I then also look at lists of prompts and turn each one into something slightly different.

 

Creating events 

This reminds me a little of lesson-planning. I enjoy creating events, whether they are our annual celebration events, book launches for myself or other writers, or seminars and talks on aspects of writing and publishing.

 

Working with restraints 

This is a little like working with prompts anyway.  You have to come up with something specific, maybe a certain number of words, or in a certain time frame or on a certain theme. I once created some higher reading papers for GCSE German. They had to include certain words and phrases, be pertinent to certain skill levels and there was a fairly strict word count.  Great fun. I made them all episodes of the same story which began to read a little like something from My Family.  

Image by Gerd Altmann from Pixabay

 

Girl in a Smart Uniform

It all started from one of those situations where truth was stranger than fiction. In fact the truth was so strange that I eventually decided to self—publish all of my books in the Schellberg Cycle. Most publishers thought it was just too far-fetched:  Renate Edler didn’t realise that she was Jewish until a few days before she came to England on the Kindertransport. “How could she not know she was Jewish?” they cried. Well, she just didn’t.  

Something else very odd happened at about that time. Her grandmother, the Jewish connection, but long since converted to Lutheranism, sheltered a school for the disabled children in her cellar. It survived there pretty well undisturbed and after the war ended continued much as it had before the Nazi regime arose. In fact it carried on in the house and only moved out when it got too big for this residential property We know that the equivalent of Dad’s Army were asked to destroy it. They refused and the Hitler Youth were charged with the task. They too refused so it was left to the girls. But for some reason they decided to let the children out first. Thank goodness.

Girl in a Smart Uniform attempts to work out how that may have happened. It also looks at what motivated young women to become good BDM members (the girls’ version of the Hitler Youth).

It does contain some people who really lived. Yet they are background figures here. This it to date the most fictional of my stories in The Schellberg Cycle. You can read more about them here.  

I find this an interesting process. It’s a little like acting. You have to get into the characters’ heads and work out what they would do in these circumstances. I suppose we might call it imagination. I found this useful at many stages in this project. There are primary resources, repeated experience and this very useful tool: the imagination. It’s as essential for writing historical fiction as it is for fantasy.  

Writing History

I’m currently working on my second Holocaust project. This is the story of one Clara Lehrs, born in 1871 and exterminated in 1942 at Treblinka. I’m writing about her life from 1918, when her husband died, until her own death in 1947. See more on my blog The House onSchellberg Street.

I have the bare bones of the story and if I divide that into scenes there is pretty well a full length book – probably about 90,000 words.

Two types of details

Concrete facts        

In order to tell the story accurately there are certain things I really need to know:

• Where people lived
• Where they married
• Where children were born
• Which day of the week certain dates fall on
• What was happening in the background in key places at key times – e.g. Mecklenburg, Berlin, Jena, Stuttgart, Rexingen, 1918, 1924, 1928, 1933, 1938, 1942

Setting details

At various times I need to know about:

·         Homes

·         Clothes

·         Towns

·         Transport

·         Political problems that impinge on everyday life e.g. inflation, treatment of Jews,

·         Feelings of well-being / feelings of being oppressed

Sources of information

Primary resources

·         documents  - death / birth certificates

·         verbatim accounts written at the time

·         diaries

·         letters  

I actually own quite a few of these so that was a good start.

Repeated experience

·         train journeys through Europe

·         visits to places mentioned above plus Theresienstadt and Treblinka  

·         viewing the house on Schellberg Street

I’m planning a trip to cover this and I’ve used crowd-funding to finance it.

Research through imagination

There are some things we just cannot find out. At that point all we can do is put the characters in the situation with as many facts as we know and as much setting material as we can muster and see what happens. It almost becomes a type of “method” writing – a little like method acting.  

Procrastination tool?    

I tend to ascertain the verifiable facts before I write. However, the writing itself asks more questions. How did young married women behave in the early 1890s? What was it like living in Berlin 1871 – 1914 (la belle époque)?  What did they wear back then? Even when I’m sitting at my desk writing I tend to do two hours research to one hour of writing.

Then there are the visits and researching the concrete details.

So this particular 90,000 words will take a long time to write.  No matter, all the other activities are writerly ones and not actually a procrastination tool even if that’s what they look like.

And actually, what an interesting way to spend one’s time.    

Self-discipline – the number one requisite for the writer

What does a writer need more than anything else? Talent? Imagination? Time? Brain space? Faith? Hope? Probably all of these. But above all else the writer needs self-discipline. That is what creates the opportunity for these other important qualities to exist.

Talent?

What is a talented writer anyway? I’ve certainly come across some writers who seem to have a gift. Writing comes easily and without making much effort at all they produce something beautiful. Where are these writers, though, when they run out of ideas or the publisher imposes a deadline that’s awkward? In fact successful writers often even have to be more self-disciplined: it’s no longer a matter of fitting in a couple of hours after work. The only opportunity to write may come on a crowded train or in an unfamiliar hotel bedroom after a day of publicity events.

Imagination?

As time goes by we use up all of our good ideas and in fact some that seemed good actually don’t translate into a story that works. We have to force the imagination. It may seem a step backwards but trying a few creative writing exercises can help here. Writers, anyway, need time out. Time when they switch off from the constant thought about their work. It takes some self-discipline to create that. It feels and looks bizarre – just doing nothing. That then has to be combined with the other self-discipline of sitting down with the note pad or at the keyboard, even when you think you have nothing to say. Faith comes in here a little: the more often you do that the easier it gets. You know you will be able to write something.  I’ve actually noticed I often write better when I’ve felt less comfortable with it.

Time?

You can always make / find time. While the baby’s asleep. In your lunch break. After the children have gone to bed. Successful writers do. Often, once people become “full-time” writers, they actually don’t spend any more time writing than they did when they were fitting it around other things. The experience of writing may be more enjoyable, and possibly the quality is better but time isn’t the only factor there. They may well be doing other “writerly” things with the rest of their day.

The trick is not to expect too much of yourself. Don’t say you will write for an hour a day because if you’ve only got ten minutes, you won’t attempt to write. Chances are, if you try for ten minutes a day, you’ll more often than spend much longer at your desk.

Did you know that it is widely believed that you need 10,000 hours at your craft before you are ready for the public?

Brain space?

It isn’t just a question of time, though, is it? If you’ve had a fraught day, it’s hard to get into the right frame of mind to write. It is for that reason my first activity of the day is always my writing. I then feel free to spend as long as is needed on anything else. I know I am lucky: even though I am not a full-time writer, my day job is very much about my writing and if my line-manager walked into my office right now, he would have no problem with the fact that I am writing this on my work computer in my employer’s time.

It wasn’t always thus. I did my Masters in Writing for Children whilst keeping up with my own writing, entering every competition going (I don’t do that now – I’m much more selective) and being Head of Modern languages at a challenging school in Basingstoke. I worked very late in the evening, weekends and school holidays. Oh, and my own children were teenagers at the time and you know what that means.  

You have to form an hiatus between your normal concerns and what your writing needs. Tea or mediation might work. Put all of your concerns about the rest of your life on hold – write a list, maybe – if it’s on the list it is going to be dealt with – or try worry dolls. Tell the dog. Whatever works for you. Then get writing.

A colleague of mine swears by changing space. Leave the office and go home. Move to another room. Have a different desk for writing from the one where you pay household bills. I’ve tried that too – it really does work. 

Three resources for Writers

We have primary resources: those things we know. They always say write what you know. We have memories and experiences, and second-hand resources of others – diaries, interviews and people who knew them.
Secondly, we can seek experiences. Ask to be locked in police cell for a few hours. Learn to sail. Take a trip around a racing track.
Thirdly we can explore with our imagination. Of course, even that is based on our own experiences. But we really do need this resource if we are to write fantasy and science fiction. Even using our imagination is working with what we know. We see the scenes and still write with our senses. They relate to what we have already experienced.