Dealing with ideas

Discussion in 'Plot Development' started by Daniel, Jul 7, 2006.

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  1. Spirit of seasons

    Spirit of seasons Active Member

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    I used to have this problem all the time, but now that I'm basically writing every day that I can, it seems like my thoughts are more focused. Occasionally a great idea strikes and then I have to act on it, or just try to retain it till I can get another chance to write. Having a set time to do work helps, but it can make writing feel like a job, even if it's meant to be fun so some variance can be helpful. My normal day consists of getting ready to work, reading on the buss, trying to remember good ideas during work, and then rushing home to put them onto paper. (not literally, I only use a computer) One of my favorite Steven King quotes mentions something very similar to this, he talks about how you shouldn't right down your ideas because the good ones will stay with you. Not everyone has a perfect memory so this might not be ideal, but try to practice remembering stuff so you don't have to write down every single spark.
     
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  2. MikeyC

    MikeyC Active Member

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    I have a TERRIBLE memory, so i have to write them all down, otherwise i really will forget them all. I remember Stephen King saying that, but for me wouldn't work lol. A total pain in the a**


    Rgds
     
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  3. CAROLINE J. THIBEAUX

    CAROLINE J. THIBEAUX Member

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    Try going for a walk or doing something that does not take a lot of concentration. It occupies the conscious mind and allows the subconscious mind to flourish. But yes, when all is quiet, at night, the stories come out. lol. That is what got me started.
     
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  4. Cave Troll

    Cave Troll It's Coffee O'clock everywhere. Contributor

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    I write primarily between 2300-0130, it is the best time for me to write
    and it just kinda works.
     
  5. Seven Crowns

    Seven Crowns Moderator Staff Supporter Contributor Contest Winner 2022

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    It's hypnagogia, the state between sleep and wakefulness. There are areas of the brain that shut down then, and their lack of influence allows you to think in new ways. (Prefrontal cortex is the culprit, I believe.) For some people, it's when they're most creative. There are quite a few artists and inventors that deliberately take advantage of it. Salvidor Dali swore by it and wrote a bit about the process in his books. Edison was big on it too. He would sleep sitting in a chair and would hold ball bearings so that when he fell asleep and dropped them, the sound of them would wake him up. That way he could record his thoughts rather than sleeping through them.

    Poe also used the technique: (sorry, this is a dense read)

    They arise in the soul (alas, how rarely!) only at its epochs of most intense tranquility — when the bodily and mental health are in perfection — and at those mere points of time where the confines of the waking world blend with those of the world of dreams . . . I have proceeded so far, secondly, as to prevent the lapse from the point of which I speak — the point of blending between wakefulness and sleep — as to prevent at will, I say, the lapse from this border-ground into the dominion of sleep. Not that I can continue the condition — not that I can render the point more than a point — but that I can startle myself from the point into wakefulnessand thus transfer the point itself into the realm of Memory — convey its impressions, or more properly their recollections, to a situation where (although still for a very brief period) I can survey them with the eye of analysis.
    He was trying to hold the moment of creativity and then wake himself up the same way as Edison.

    Robert Olen Butler (Pulitzer for Fiction, 1993) was really big on this too. He called it the dreamspace. He has a book where he talks about it a lot. "From Where You Dream." I'd recommend that title. There's nothing about sentence construction, grammar, etc. in it. It's about big picture ideas, creativity and purpose.
     
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  6. badgerjelly

    badgerjelly Contributor Contributor

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    Yeah, the hypnagogic state is quite unique. It’s not really something one can easily put into practice though - unless you want to force sleep deprivation on yourself.
     
  7. S A Lee

    S A Lee Contributor Contributor

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    On top of what is mentioned, we overstimulate ourselves these days, but our most creative stuff comes about from boredom. That's part of the theory behind Cal Newport's Deep Work.
     
  8. Rohan89

    Rohan89 Member

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    I'm the same!

    I don't work a 9-5 so I have let my sleep hours slide.
     
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  9. MikeyC

    MikeyC Active Member

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    Again last night, happily lying there in the sweltering heat, trying to think of ways i could plumb a waterfall on my head while I sleep - wishing i had a waterbed, just so i could knife it open and slip into cold water - i came up with another awesome idea for my current book.

    Out of bed, on the computer, write the bugger down.......feeling tired today!


    Rgds
     
  10. newjerseyrunner

    newjerseyrunner Contributor Contributor Contest Winner 2022

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    Most of these ideas come from the frontal cortex in your brain. This lobe is the main central processor for dopamine, which stimulates it to take in, sort, filter, and process everything that your senses take in. Without dopamine, that part of the brain can't stay focused. It'll just start sorting your memories and be less receptive to information coming in, dramatically lowering your inhibitions. This allows thoughts that wouldn't normally pass through your filtering to seep through. As you enter the later part of the day, you're not producing as much dopamine, which makes you feel tired.

    Alcohol and certain drugs also affect dopamine reception, but the easiest way to achieve this state is to simply exhaust yourself. During a run, your body will pump out tons of dopamine, then when you stop, you'll be dopamine deficient for a little while. Your mind should be in the same state as it is right before bed.

    You find this difficult when you want to be creative because you are focusing. Focusing is the opposite of what you want for this state.
     
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  11. Drinkingcrane

    Drinkingcrane Active Member

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    I have to say that language come first for me. A good plot should organically emerge from the language not be artificially constructed before hand. Goood language adds power an weight to a story. Of course eloquence should add to the story and not distract from it. Make the story more powerful. If the author is just trying to impress us with his vocabulary then it distracts from the story. One example is blood meridian, my favorite book, at first I just though cormac was being eloquent for the sake o eloquent but when I looked his vocabulary in the dictionary I realized that he know exactly what each word meant and he was using the exact right word in the right context. But I believe that in blood meridian the language came first an the rest o father book grew out of the language.
     
  12. Siena

    Siena Senior Member

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    Ideas first. Language second.
     
  13. writingistelepathy

    writingistelepathy Member

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    I believe they both come hand in hand!

    The same great idea for a story could be written by two different, skilled authors - but it will be immediately obvious which one conveys the story in the most interesting way through the way it is written. But if both are excellent, reader perception and the market decides which one is successful.

    Also the underlying themes and sub plots which the writer develops throughout the main plot is crucial. If the main plot is great but there’s nothing else going on or any meaningful subplots - that is a recipe for disaster as the reader cannot relate to the story. A simple example is Hunger Games - the main dystopian story is fantastic but the underlying themes of politics, romance, entertainment industry etc is where the book becomes something relatable and groundbreaking.
     
  14. Alan Aspie

    Alan Aspie Banned Contributor

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    Neither.

    Creative structure is more important than neither of those. And I underline with a very big pen that creative structure is not the same as story structure.

    Ideas are just ideas. They need execution. Without execution they are half dead. And most of your ideas are old. Someone else invented and executed them long time ago. And then someone else. And someone and...

    Language can be fixed in rewriting.

    But there is this strange glue that glues ideas to clusters, characters to crews, happenings to lines and archs, executions to series of executions..... That glue makes individual parts to be one entirety...

    It is the creative way to combine creative parts to one creative machine that works. I call it just now creative structure because it is the structure of creative working and creative work. It is the thing between things.

    If you can handle this thing between things, then you can arrange, fix, modify, create... so that things click to other things and form parts that click to other parts and everything is both elastic and tough.
     
  15. DeeDee

    DeeDee Contributor Contributor

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    Ideas trump all ;)
     
  16. The Dapper Hooligan

    The Dapper Hooligan (V) ( ;,,;) (v) Contributor

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    Oh good. Looks like I can go back to bed and not worry about cranking out any pages.
     
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  17. Alan Aspie

    Alan Aspie Banned Contributor

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    You are wrong.

    Once some wanna-be was talking with an author. Wanna-be argued that ideas trump all. Author argued that execution is important and ideas are not as important.

    Wanna-be was resilient. Author wanted to get rid of stupid and boring conversation. So he said:

    "Just give me the worst possible idea and I write a book about it. And it will be awesome book."

    Wanna-be was silent. Then he said. "Ok. Pokemon and lost roman legion."

    And then author wrote.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Codex_Alera


     
    Last edited: Sep 20, 2018
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  18. Edward M. Grant

    Edward M. Grant Contributor Contributor

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    In most genres, what matters is the story. But the writing has to be competent enough to tell that story.

    Just look at a few bestsellers and you'll immediately see that the actual words on the page are rarely more than competent. It's how they use the words that matters.
     
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  19. Bone2pick

    Bone2pick Conspicuously Conventional Contributor

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    I think how you define 'execution' is critical. If you're merely talking about the ability to communicate with the written word, then I would give the edge to ideas. There are journalists and English teachers who have a strong command of the language but can't write worthwhile fiction to save their life.
     
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  20. Abbey_S

    Abbey_S New Member

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    I have to agree with most people that ideally both should be strong. But as someone who struggles with the idea aspect of writing I feel that it may hold a little bit more weight. I have read a number of books that I love the idea and truly enjoy the book, but can identify that the writing is not great.
     
  21. deadrats

    deadrats Contributor Contributor

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    Every writer or want-to-be writer always says how many ideas they have. They have more ideas than they could ever get to regardless of how well they write. So, everyone has got great ideas. Good writing doesn't have to stand out as good writing. Good writing lets the idea take center stage. But without good writing, the ideas are pretty useless. That's where the execution comes in.

    I see execution as the whole package. When I was in graduate school there was often a noticeable difference between how the MA English majors wrote vs. MFA writing majors. It's a different path. The English majors were looking to become teachers. A lot of MFA grads teach as well but mostly at a university level and their primary focus tends to remain with creative writing. Journalism is also a different kind of writing. I am a retired journalist and it took me years and going back to school to write fiction well enough to publish. And never once in all my schooling was there any talk on how to generate more ideas. Of course there are writing prompts and things like that, but to me that was pretty much practice and preparation to tackle my real ideas. Molding those ideas into a work at a publishable and professional level for the creative writing scene was a different story than just writing something out and hoping the idea is good enough to carry a piece of work. I don't see them as the same thing and I don't think they often can achieve the same thing. Everyone has story ideas, executing them is a different skill than just making things up or having a good imagination.
     
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  22. Irina Samarskaya

    Irina Samarskaya Senior Member

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    The more I think about it, the less sure I am.

    It all depends on what is meant by "Ideas" versus "Language/Execution".

    If someone asked me to define "ideas", I'd essentially say "the general plot as well as every sentence building it". And that could be pretty much everything (if not literally everything). "Language" ties heavily into "ideas" since what language (in terms of complexity, fluidity, etc.) to use is in itself an "idea" to compliment the character or scene in the story. "Execution" doesn't mean much differently, from what I'd assume.

    "Story" versus "Writing" might be a better debate since "ideas" is a very wide umbrella that "language/execution" happens to fall under. Story and Writing are both a bit vague, but at least more consistently defined.

    And if I had to choose between "Story" versus "Writing", I would not be able to answer as I tend to consider writing that I enjoy to be good and stories I enjoy to be good as well. Therefore they're one and the same, as far as I am concerned.

    So, I think any debate on the subject is futile since the items aren't even defined.
     
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  23. deadrats

    deadrats Contributor Contributor

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    People know what ideas are and people know what language is. And we're all writers so if we are struggling with such terms there are probably bigger problems. I don't see the point in switching out the words to have the same argument. But whatever.
     
  24. Iain Sparrow

    Iain Sparrow Banned Contributor

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    I'll counter that argument.

    Jim Butcher is a better writer, technically speaking, than ever JRR Tolkien was. I think we can agree on that. But there isn't one story I've read of Butcher's that can hold a candle to Lord of the Rings. Long after Butcher and his nauseating hard-boiled wizard are forgotten, people will still be reading Tolkien's creation. Story first. Everything else second.
     
  25. Irina Samarskaya

    Irina Samarskaya Senior Member

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    Because if my interpretation of something differs from your's, we cannot argue because I'm talking about the flavor of apples and you're talking about the color of oranges.

    Language is not something I can objectively measure the quality of because "it depends". Like a simple-minded character probably shouldn't sound all that eloquent and verbose; perhaps writing him as simple rather than verbose is "better language". Or it isn't. I'm not sure what "better language" is beyond comprehensibility, and I'd consider "having a stronger effect" more important than complexity or eloquence. Like cursing somebody out could be more effective in expressing anger than detailing points of objection because the intended effect of either of these actions may simply be to antagonize and provoke. In which cases insults are more effective than criticism--especially if the provocateur is better with his fists than his mouth and can bet the recipient will respond more harshly to a direct insult than any criticism, honest or not.

    And "ideas" would be whether I'd want to write something this way or that way. Would it be a good idea for the simple-minded guy to think simply and act simply or is it a better idea for his mind to contradict his actions? I don't know, it depends on what the point is.

    Language is to ideas what bread is to a sandwich. Idea is the sandwich; language is the bread. Without the bread there is no sandwich, and without a concept of sandwich it'll take some trial and error to make and name one. Arguing which is more important, based on my understanding, is like arguing whether legs or arms are more important when both are needed for a fully functional body.
     

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