Thursday, November 17, 2005

WORK. RELAXATION. DON'T THINK.

So says Ray Bradbury in his book Zen in the Art of Writing. And it's true: writing is a matter of doing, and the thing that clogs the artery of creative juices is getting uptight and self-conscious. Today, try to writing something just for yourself, with no thought of showing it to others. You'll be amazed by what pours forth.

2 comments:

  1. I'll go look up that Ray Bradbury book. His excitement about writing is catching. I interviewed him on the QE2 when I was writing an article on writers at work on a transatlantic crossing (Francis Ford Coppola was finishing a script on that same voyage.)

    Bradbury told a story I'll never forget. He was saying that we need to stick with our passions however odd they may seem to others. He told about being into some cartoon spaceman for years after he was considered too old. Kids made fun of him and he went home and threw out his collection of Captain Whoever. Then as an adult he tried to succeed as a writer of mainstream nonscifi fiction. Didn't work. On a lark, he went back to his old interest, wrote a story about a dragon. Years later he picked up the phone. It was the director John Huston. He had run across the old story about the dragon, wanted Bradbury to write a script for him that had the same feel to it. The story was about a white whale. The movie Moby Dick turned out to be Bradbury's breakthrough. And all because he came back to the fantastical that was his love.

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