creativity – Ink-Stained Wretches

The Arts and Our Society

by Francine Paino

Day after day, whether we want to or not, we hear nothing but murder, mayhem, the politics of personal destruction, and a new insistence on rigid lines of political correctness. Somehow we put one foot in front of the other and march on – sometimes wondering to what end. On November 16, I had an experience that washed all of that away, even if just for a little while.

I attended a special concert by the Austin Symphony Orchestra at the Lake Travis Performing Arts Center. As expected, Maestro Peter Bay and his orchestra were superb in their renditions of Holst, Mozart, and Musorgsky. But Mr. Bay went beyond. To provide another level of inspiration to young musicians in training, he reached out and arranged for sixteen music students from Lake Travis High School to join the orchestra, some even given the honor of sitting in the first chairs.

For this brief moment, all the tensions of daily life melted away, and I felt a surge of renewed hope for the future, for in the arts lies the unity of humankind. At the concert, I cannot tell you if I saw people of color, blonds, brunettes, or greying heads on the stage.

I only saw musicians making sounds that swelled my soul and transcended the noise of our daily lives.

Artists in all disciplines must reach for more, whether conceiving an architectural masterpiece, a painting, an opera, a ballet, or a symphony. In their quest for excellence, their creations help erase the boundaries that separate us as people. Those who create must look beyond the narrow limits of mob-think; they must see in vivid colors, hear in vivid sounds, and often take the roads less traveled. They may be reclusive in the process of creating, but they do not function in isolation. Individuals who dedicate themselves to artistic development have a strong sense of self, driven to self-actualization. Their visions give to society while they draw from their cultures and many academic disciplines.

Painters see in colors, form, and proportions. Composers and musicians operate within mathematical formulas: divisions of time; use of fractions to indicate the length of notes. Dancers operate within the structures of Physical Science and the theories of motion and gravity. Actors must empty themselves to absorb the characters they play on stage – This requires looking beyond their own perceptions and truths.

The arts are vital to humanity. They give flight to imagination and creativity and should be an essential part of academic education. Albert Einstein, perhaps one of the most highly self-actualized human beings, once said, “Creativity is intelligence at play.”

The Austin Symphony Orchestra and Lake Travis High School showed us a model for Einstein’s playful quote. We watched and listened to the young, who are still fresh and full of hope, join the seasoned professionals, and reach for excellence. They expanded their horizons and brought a diverse audience together in admiration.

You may be thinking, lovely sentiment, but how do we do it?

Many believe that the government should become the primary support for everything – including the arts. That road too quickly leads to a government having the power to define and control creativity. Study the long list of artists who defected from socialist/oppressive nations where the State defines what art is and how it’s to be expressed. The government can, however, have a constructive place in nurturing our children’s individual creative development.

Block grants to school districts, earmarked explicitly for promoting artistic growth, might be of great value in helping our young reach for their stars, and in the process, build bridges between people and help elevate humanity to higher levels of well-being. That requires recognition and respect for the fact that people are different, and the differences go deeper than color or ethnicity.

The arts ensure that diverse identities and cultures are recognized and given a voice in the world. The arts of every culture reach back in time, relying on those who came before. Present-day artists build on the past and expand their disciplines, reflecting today’s world. Our art not only leaves a record of who we are, but also the growth we’ve contributed to the future.

Learning to Write My Way: A Cautionary Tale

Don’t do what I did.

First, I learned how to write. Then, I learned how not to write. Then, I had to relearn how to write again.

woman-thinking writing When I first started writing, each story was a new adventure with new characters and settings. Stories ideas would come into my brain, marinate for a few days, and then I’d start working. I didn’t make a conscious plan to create stories in any particular genre. I wrote stories for me, telling the stories I wanted to tell as the ideas came to me. Having analyzed and written short stories during my education, the process came naturally to me. I simply sat down and began working, knowing the story needed a strong opening, rising action, a climax, and a dénouement.

As I grew more confident in my work and began submitting my short stories to magazines, I thought I’d figured out how to write. So I challenged myself to complete a novel length work, 60,000 words. I decided to write a mystery novel.

WritingMessy But although I’d analyzed novels previously, the only thing I’d written of any great length was a nonfiction honor’s thesis for my undergraduate degree. I had never studied how to craft a novel. While I knew the story still required the same basic pieces, the idea of creating something so long and complex without preparation seemed daunting. I decided to read books about the process, to learn what I needed to know before diving in blindly.

Unfortunately, I chose the wrong books to direct me. Though the books came with great reviews and were highly recommended for learning to craft mystery novels, they all espoused one particular style: a carefully plotted method that involved mapping the book in detail in advance. Recognizing this as the method I had been taught to produce nonfiction, I thought, “Oh, I can do this. I’ve done this before. This must be the way to produce book-length works.”

All of my short stories had been written in a free-flowing, organic style with minimal advance plotting. I scribbled down a handful of notes and ideas on character or plot and started working, letting the story come to life on the page as I went. When I tried to write my first novel, I dropped that spontaneous process and tried to plot everything as the books I’d read suggested.

leave-839225_1280 And thus, I shot myself in the foot. I inhibited my writing process by trying to follow someone else’s methods.

The joy went out of my work.

I was unable to get beyond a chapter or two before quitting.

After reassessing the situation, I began looking for other ways of crafting novels. This search lead me to discover the “pantser vs plotter” approaches. “Pantsers,” people who wrote “by the seat of their pants,” making things up as they went, were a whole category of authors. Their approach was fundamentally opposite to the “plotters,” authors who planned and outlined all the details in advance. Once I learned about these basic style differences, I found other authors who advised beginners to find their own method for writing books and not try to use anyone else’s. I found blogs and quotes from successful authors that said the only rule for writing was to actually put words on the page. How you arrived at that point was irrelevant.

Cartoonwomanwriting0 — *All pictures from Pixabay*

So I took another stab at writing a novel, having finally understood that I had to write “my way” and not somebody else’s way. I finished my first novel, a second, and a third, and now the fourth will be coming out later this year. So, learn from my mistake. Don’t let anyone tell you that you have to follow their method to write a book. Find your own process and start writing.

Thank You, Lady Gaga

by K.P. Gresham

I recently had the incredible honor of attending Lady Gaga’s Las Vegas Jazz Show. I say honor, because this woman is so talented. Not just at singing, or dancing or playing the piano.

This lady can write.

I write fiction. I like to say I kill people for a living. This incredible woman writes the language of the soul.

I was struck by one song in particular. I am in the final stages of putting out my next book, MURDER ON THE THIRD TRY. The questions I ask myself are overwhelming, and all have a common theme: Is this book any good? I know this something most writers struggle with. Actually, Robert De Niro said it best. “The mind of a writer can be a truly terrifying thing. Isolated, neurotic, caffeine-addled, crippled by procrastination and consumed by feelings of panic, self-loathing and soul-crushing inadequacy. And that’s on a good day.” That pretty much sums up my inner dialogue as I walked into Lady Gaga’s show.

Then she performed “Born This Way.”

From the time I learned to read and write, I knew I wanted to be an author. I wanted to create worlds that people could escape to, tell stories that would make people laugh. I wanted my creations to go down on paper and be shared with my friends and family. I knew in my heart I was born to be a writer.

One of the lyrics in “Born This Way” says, “In the religion of the insecure I must be myself, respect my youth.” This spoke to me on so many levels, but especially made me remember that I’ve known all my life that writing is what I born to do.

As Lady Gaga sings, “I’m beautiful in my way ‘cause God makes no mistakes. I’m on the right track, baby, I was born this way…I was born to survive…I was born to be brave…Don’t hide yourself in regret…There ain’t no other way.”

Writers, we are who we are. All the creativity and self-doubt. All the procrastination and all-nighters. All the work at honing our skills and all the stuff we haven’t learned yet. Our lives would be a lot better if we could come to terms with ourselves as Lady Gaga has written it so beautifully. Be brave. Accept this is what we do and don’t look back or give in to doubts. We’re on the right track.

Wow. Thank you, Lady Gaga for talking to my soul that night. I’ll try to keep your words in my heart. Damn the torpedoes, full speed ahead, I’ll keep writing.

After all, I was born this way.