When a writer starts a new project there is excitement; we are about to undertake an expedition that could take a hour, a day, or ten years. When we, the writer, quit a writing project we are opening one door and shutting another. This essay will explore the basics in creative writing: Why we start a project, why we quit, and the path to success that lies somewhere in between.
Never quit your art.
A writer can be quite a character. Ask one how their work is going one day and they will light up; another and they will hide behind their beer or cigarette and mutter something. The path to creative writing is a hard one if we intend to make a living doing this. Writers by definition are troubled souls who try to find something on the lonely page that excites them. When the words of a short story, novella, or novel fail for them, they escape to something else. But, as a drug, writing is hard to put down forever. Once we try to escape it we will see it in everything.
Starting a new creative writing project is like doctor Frankenstein trying to create life; for all his good intentions this “creation” could turn out bad, but the good doctor has to try anyways. Our project need not be daunting, but the writer, initially, is stuck between whether they want the story to have life or just get it out of them. A piece of writing may never find a home. Why write it? The key to most creative writers is that, when discovering whether something is good or bad, they find the process a joy. We can pull hairs out editing something later, but for now we are Columbus setting sail.
Doctor Frankenstein should have never created the monster. When we quit a project, often we have the same thoughts. Why did we start to begin with? This is, in short, a terrible waste of time. That is the creative mind at work: we start, quit, start, and quit again. We go through cycles as writers. Some days we will want to build the monster from scratch; other days we just want to forget it.
There is a path to success that lies in between. There was no happy ending for Doctor Frankenstein, but there can be for the writer. Before we quit a project consider why it was started. There must be something deep within us that wanted to find the words, put them to the page, and show it to others. Our beast may not be ready for others eyes for years, but, in the end, we never know. In order to find success we must capture that drive in the beginning to write, catch the doubts in a net before they consume us, and dream as much as Mary Shelley did when she wrote “Frankenstein.” Consider the merits of writing a novel: we can write on anything we want. Consider the merits of a creative essay: we can explore the mind.
We will start and quit; it is in the writer’s nature. And, when we discover the monster within us, the one that wants to quit, we should let it out on the page. Science was Doctor Frankenstein’s ally; our ally is the words we discover when we start a project.
July 15th, 2011 at 7:16 am
Writing as a monster. We do all recognize it. Don´t we?