Q&A 3: Writer's block

Ken Kleinman writes:

Do you ever get writer's block? How do you decide which of the 12 items on your whiteboard to work on next?

Ken's asked a two-parter here, but as neither part was in the form of a statement as opposed to a question, I'm happy to tackle them as a piece.

"Do you ever get writer's block?"

I never get writer's block. I can find sections of writing more difficult than others, I might stare at a gap where a satisfactory line is needed for fifteen or twenty minutes, but I know that there is going to be something in that gap eventually. I don't really know what writer's block is. 

BUT WAIT, MAYBE I DO!

As a child and a teenager, I produced comic stories very sporadically. They were ill-formed and uninspired, and as a result, I didn't produce many of them. I'd have bursts of creativity - a very strong desire to "make", but this would last about a month a year. And these were quite shapeless superhero comics, often petering out after 2 or 3 pages. Sometimes I might manage 11 pages, which called for stapling together. But I burnt them all on a bonfire when I was about 15 (yes I know, bad) so there is no way to get forensic with that stuff. There's material from my late teens, it's better drawn (sometimes a lot better drawn than the early Bobbins comics!) but similarly uninspired in terms of content.

When I committed to producing daily material (as 'Bobbins' in 1998), I also committed to banging out every idea I had at the time and not being precious about it. The ideas were frequently cobweb-thin. If you're willing to accept (at least at first) whatever garbage your brain has to offer, without embarrassment, you aren't really going to have writer's block. You may reveal terrible things about yourself in the process but that is the flip side of creativity, the accidental unveiling of the unrestrained id.

As, over the years, I have needed material, week on week, I've had to strip mine my personality. Events, people, the things I've read and watched and experienced, all ground up into a hopefully unrecognisable sausage-meat. It's boring and trite to say that you have to keep consuming stuff to make more sausages, but you do. Ideally I would live a wild and expansive lifestyle and feed that back into my work. But given my limited means and feeble constitution, I try to read widely instead. 

Ultimately, the more you know about how the world works, and what goes on beyond your limited experience, the more ideas you'll have. If you've got writer's block, I think you're sick of your own personality as expressed on the page. Because you can always write something. If it seems sub-par, the reason won't be far away. It all comes down to your ability to let yourself off the hook.

Obviously I am subject to the same stresses and pressures as anybody else. There are times when I don't want to write, or don't feel funny, or am so tired that I don't want to hammer a truculent plot into shape. So I have begun to stockpile ideas, an "is this anything?" list, which I refine when I feel like it. The idea is that these stories (usually broken down as per the previous Q&A) roll off the production line and are ready to go when I need a story. Sometimes they need re-tooling, or can be broken down for parts. But writer's block, the terror of the blank sheet of paper is the least of my problems. I have become a gardener of ideas. And this has created a new problem...

"How do you decide which of the 12 items on your whiteboard to work on next?"

Ken is referring to an offhand comment I made a little while ago about the story list on my whiteboard. I found I had 12 story titles, rounded little ideas, for Charlotte Grote mystery tales. I didn't mention that I had a similar stash for Steeple, and a few Destroy History stories, and a whole completely new and weird Mildred series, and a Giant Days spin-off. Then there was a new series I pitched in the midst of the pandemic that wasn't quite right but could easily have been fixed, that had its own complete, silly, self-contained world. And I  probably can't make all these stories. 

This probably started when I was working on Giant Days for Boom. Every four weeks, I needed a new 'A' plot, and a 'B' plot, so I had to become a bit of a squirrel. I've not had to work that fast since, but my brain seems to be stuck in that gear.

I have had to accept that the flip side of avoiding writer's block is a surplus that might never get used. There's a psychological downside to that, too - I work stories up, pad them out, then decide that I don't want to fully script and draw them. I've had all the fun I want to out of them as a mental exercise. The shine goes off the ideas. Having too many toys, like a spoiled child, wasn't a luxury I had in the past. But there will probably come a time when I need them. 

In the meantime, all I can do is guess which stories readers will like the most. Writing is a solipsistic act but sharing that work should be generous. I make things in the hope that others will have a good time. That invariably coincides with me having a good time writing them. I don't believe in the process as punishment - which to me sums up trying to write through "writer's block".

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That's the last of the questions from the initial batch that merits an essay. So please keep asking!

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