How to Solve This Problem
For the past month and a half I have been listless and ill-tempered, struggling to get out of bed in the morning. I haven’t wanted to write. I haven’t wanted to leave the apartment, to do much of anything. Dust accumulated in layers, enveloping pictures and knick-knacks like future fossils, insects frozen in amber. Bedsheets remained at the foot of the bed like tangled ghosts. Everything just seemed like so much effort.
On Sunday, I finally finished the poorly-written book I’ve been reading for the past month and a half.
October 21st, 2008 at 1:39 pm
You need to change your environment. Force yourself to go out to a local coffee house with your laptop and a dictionary, turn off your wifi and just crank out 3000 words.
October 21st, 2008 at 1:44 pm
I think I just needed to start reading Samuel Johnson is Indignant again. And for those of you wondering, it was The Mole People.
October 22nd, 2008 at 6:22 pm
Have you read “Bird by Bird”? I am halfway through it right now. It makes you want to write SO MUCH. Also, it confirmed that the way I used to think writing was supposed to happen, was right. College made me think it was wrong. But it was right.
October 22nd, 2008 at 6:46 pm
Thanks for the recommend! I’m debating my next book right now: I think you just sold me.
I went to college for the writing workshops, and left college a bitter woman.
October 23rd, 2008 at 7:53 pm
Seriously. As a kid growing up all I wanted to do was make stories up in my head and use all the wonderful words I knew to write them. Then I went to college and suddenly I needed to worry about story arcs and metaphors and character development and themes. I was too scared to write again for a long time. I still can’t write the way I used to when I was 13, which kind of sucks. I think you’ll like this book a lot.
October 23rd, 2008 at 9:30 pm
I could be wrong, but I think the Toth book is generally considered to be somewhat untrue.
I don’t know if that makes you feel better or worse or the same (or you already knew it), but there it is.
October 23rd, 2008 at 9:33 pm
Yeah, I was reading an article about that after I’d finished the book. I think it would have made me more willing to stop reading and move on. Ah well.