I hiate hiatus. Sorry, I hate hiatus. By hiatus I mean not writing anything for four days or more. A break of one day is a pause for thought. That’s fine; it means you’re thinking about stuff. Two days? Well, that could be a busy weekend, catching up on jobs, entertaining the kids. Being a family guy or girl. Three days…well, now it’s a worry. What was it you were writing three days ago? What was happening? Why did you stop? Were you trying to improve some dialogue or maybe re-route a scene? Hmm. Get back to it tomorrow.
Then four days have passed, and you haven’t written anything. You open the word processor or thumb through the moleskine. You look at your last written words and try to put yourself back into that state of mind, that place you inhabit when your writing just flows. You can’t. You get frustrated and angry with yourself for leaving it so long.
When he’s working on a novel, Stephen King writes in excess of 2000 words a day. He won’t rest until he’s met that target, even if it’s 4am and it’s humid enough to make the underside of your forearms stick to the table and your glasses slide down your nose. King keeps his writers’ muscle well exercised, just like a professional athlete following his training regime day in day out. I bet he never has to go back to that evil place where he’s trying to make up for four day’s slacking off. Hey, his evil places are right there on the page.
I hope you’re not reading this in search of a solution to the four day problem. I have a few tricks that help to get me back in the driving seat, that’s all. I think about the story, turning it around in my head. I chew it like a bone. I watch people, pretending that they are characters from my story right there in front of me. What are they doing? What are they saying? How are they behaving? If I could control them, what would I have them do next? I watch television drama and criticise the scriptwriting and the poor characterisation. Then I turn that criticism on myself and the blank space that follows on from the last words I wrote.
Saturday night, the night before last, I finally found a way through a scene that I’m stuck on in The Novel. It’s a critical scene, because the behaviour of one of the key characters changes quite dramatically. I know why it changes and how it changes. What I didn’t know is how to show that without simply telling the reader in dull narrative description. The inspiration came during a live performance by The Black Keys on Channel 4’s Live from Abbey Road. I watched Dan Auerbach playing guitar, holding the plank near to the Marshall speakers to get some feedback. It was the way he did it, with such precision and control in the midst of unbridled noise chaos. It fitted my character perfectly, since I could visualise him doing the same thing. It was a perfect way to end the scene.
Ultimately, I should commit myself to writing every day. Writing something. Doesn’t matter what. Keep writing. Keep exercising. And finish the goddam Novel.
