Write what you know…
Write what you know, how many times have we heard that old saw. I’ve seen it referenced by neophyte writers so many times it’s well into cliche. Then they sputter and burn up because they had meager stocks of fuel to feed their creative fire. Which brings us to the pic I’ve chosen today. For one, it’s a pretty good pic (I took it) I think it symbolizes the writer. Here’s a tree forced to grow in an impossible situation. It put down roots that kept it growing as best it could but in the end, it’s own environment killed it. Not the tree’s fault, it didn’t ask to grow there, that was just it’s lot.
As our field diverges and new media emerges in its place. Our already hard job is being made harder. Add to this a government who doesn’t understand how important art in any form is to a society and you create programs to help it along not to impede it and it’s like trying to grow a wheat field in a toxic waste dump.
As we also still seem to be lacking a sense of national identity (Bob and Doug MacKenzie and the guy from the Molson beer ads not withstanding) all this mucking about doesn’t help. Guy Maddin being a prime example of this. The guy makes films that the critics seem to love and a bunch of other psuedo intelectuals say they love his shit but if you were to walk up to any ordinary person on the street they wouldn’t know who the hell you were talking about.
It is however not a an issue of national identity, it is a paucity of ideas that seems to be bleeding our collective efforts dry. So I ask for a recharging of the batteries. The creative batteries. Get out there and do something, anything, that scares or excites you. Put yourself in tricky situations or stand in a corner and watch a situation unfold. Listen to the people around you, really listen to them. They’re living lives you can’t imagine. To write what you know, you must be able to experience and then extrapolate, you need to feed the bunkers to keep the fire of creativity fueled. Or you fade and cool and go dark… forever.
Right now I’m working on a military drama where our main group of characters find themselves cut off in enemy territory. They have a long road and most likely a hard fight ahead of them. They are low on supplies and don’t like each other much but they have to trust in each other to survive this and yeah, I’m writing what I know… You know exactly what I’m talking about.