Melodrama
I realize
now how melodramatic my last post must have read, and feel thoroughly ashamed
of myself. There are, of course, worse things that can happen to you than
Writers Block. As for thinking that God had deserted me, I now cringe.
As for my marriage, I really did
feel that we were heading for the divorce courts. And yet, when we were first
married, the argument might have lasted for a month, and meant that at least
one of us would go off and stay in the parental home.
During the time we weren’t speaking,
I got to do some things by myself. I went to Kingston alone, I ate plaice and
chips at a fish restaurant, I watched a dvd from beginning to end. But I couldn't enjoy any of it.
When we made up, it was a remarkably calm affair, so much so that I wondered if we'd ever actually argued about anything.
Some other good things:
1) I've started reading To Rise Again At A Reasonable Hour by Joshua Ferris, which is hilarious. I told myself that I needed to read some non-horror literature. In fact, non-genre. Initially, I picked up Thomas Hardy's Jude The Obscure, and the few paragraphs I read of it were dynamite. But then I realized that I was enjoying it on the level of a horror story. I felt I needed to read something without melodrama and without camp. Hardy's novels are brilliant, the two I have read (The Mayor of Casterbridge and Tess of the D'Urbervilles), real page-turners. Don't let anybody tell you that Hardy is dour or humourless. But I told myself I had to read contemporary fiction. It felt like an ordeal, at first, Googling at the Man Booker winners, all with blurbs like "Alex is an architect whose marriage is in trouble" or "India takes her children to a house on the continent, where she struggles to finish her novel." Ferris's book sounded like it was funny, and about ordinary people- and I was right on both scores.
2) I've also started reading T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land. Don't ask me what it's about. Intermittently, it makes sense, but I'd be lying if I said that I understood more than ten percent of it. However, it has kind of taking me out of myself, like the modern sculptures I've been seeing at the Tate Gallery lately.
3) I've also begun on Ibsen's play Ghosts. I used to read plays all the time, when I wanted to be a playwright. I could never quite get into Chekhov, but Ibsen seemed a lot more straightforward. Again, I began with Shakespeare, which is, of course, brilliant, but I felt I needed to read modern drama. So far, Ghosts is fantastic.
4) I've carried on with Morning Pages and Writing Practice.
5) I've bitten the bullet, found one of my existing short stories, plus all the feedback I've had about it, and I'm about to start a third draft of it.
6) Finally, new ideas are coming to me. I don't want to hurry them. It has helped me that I've been doing all this other stuff, and taken my mind of Writers' block. And it feels like my prayers have been answered.
When we made up, it was a remarkably calm affair, so much so that I wondered if we'd ever actually argued about anything.
Some other good things:
1) I've started reading To Rise Again At A Reasonable Hour by Joshua Ferris, which is hilarious. I told myself that I needed to read some non-horror literature. In fact, non-genre. Initially, I picked up Thomas Hardy's Jude The Obscure, and the few paragraphs I read of it were dynamite. But then I realized that I was enjoying it on the level of a horror story. I felt I needed to read something without melodrama and without camp. Hardy's novels are brilliant, the two I have read (The Mayor of Casterbridge and Tess of the D'Urbervilles), real page-turners. Don't let anybody tell you that Hardy is dour or humourless. But I told myself I had to read contemporary fiction. It felt like an ordeal, at first, Googling at the Man Booker winners, all with blurbs like "Alex is an architect whose marriage is in trouble" or "India takes her children to a house on the continent, where she struggles to finish her novel." Ferris's book sounded like it was funny, and about ordinary people- and I was right on both scores.
2) I've also started reading T.S. Eliot's The Waste Land. Don't ask me what it's about. Intermittently, it makes sense, but I'd be lying if I said that I understood more than ten percent of it. However, it has kind of taking me out of myself, like the modern sculptures I've been seeing at the Tate Gallery lately.
3) I've also begun on Ibsen's play Ghosts. I used to read plays all the time, when I wanted to be a playwright. I could never quite get into Chekhov, but Ibsen seemed a lot more straightforward. Again, I began with Shakespeare, which is, of course, brilliant, but I felt I needed to read modern drama. So far, Ghosts is fantastic.
4) I've carried on with Morning Pages and Writing Practice.
5) I've bitten the bullet, found one of my existing short stories, plus all the feedback I've had about it, and I'm about to start a third draft of it.
6) Finally, new ideas are coming to me. I don't want to hurry them. It has helped me that I've been doing all this other stuff, and taken my mind of Writers' block. And it feels like my prayers have been answered.
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