Friday, April 8, 2011

Pacing...

No, not walking back and forth in an agitated manner...

Not controlling the speed of action and rise of tension in your story...

The insight that came to me over morning oatmeal had to do with pacing myself. That is, balancing the outflow of words (ideas, scenes...) and "refilling the well."
When I first struggled to write at a professional level, I had a small child (as in 9 months). This usually means no time for sleep, let alone writing! I learned to use very small amounts of time and to do a lot of "pre-writing," that is, mapping out the scene I was working on, rehearsing every detail in my mind, questioning whether what I imagined was really the best it could be and worked with the rest of the story, that sort of thing, so that when I finally got that precious 15 minutes or half an hour to sit down at the typewriter, I'd go like mad. I used to joke that I couldn't afford writer's block; the truth is that I'd already written the next few pages. All I had to do was transcribe them.

Now that baby and the next one are all grown (and wonderful young women they are, too) and my days are largely unstructured. The challenge then becomes how do I keep those ideas flowing at a pace that matches what I can put on paper (or in phosphors). I'm learning to tell when I've done enough by internal signals ("Rest, go do something else," urges my back-brain), rather than when I've run out of time. Very often, I'll get started on some other activity (making dinner, walking the dog, housework, yoga practice) and more ideas will pop into my head. I'm still of two minds as to whether it's better to drop what I'm doing (unhappy doggie notwithstanding) and get back to work or to simply let the "idea-well" fill again. I'd love to know what you think!

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