I recently rewatched Alien[1] with the Kid who was doing a critical film analysis for school. The tagline of the flick is “in space no one can hear you scream” and my first thought was, geeze, that kind of silence would sure help me get some solid writing in.
Unlike the Kid, who immediately plugged in her headphones and put some video on in the background to “help her focus” as she wrote her essay about xenomorphs and horror science fiction, I usually find I’m the kind of guy who needs as few distractions as possible to get shit done.
Neither of us are wrong.
Silence has many meanings, and maybe for you silence is as much about using blaring heavy metal thrasher tunes to silence the inner critic that keeps you from writing. Maybe solitude for you is the negative space of anonymity left behind by a corner table in a crowded cafe. Maybe the conditions that help you find your voice are nothing like mine, or anyone else’s and it would make anyone you explained it to cringe at the very thought.
The space to create is personal, deep, and often ineffable.
In the right space no one can hear you scream—or write or yearn for clarity or connect the dots on some great abiding inspiration. Either way, under the category of Space & Silence I’ll be writing more on this topic as the months wear on.
References
- ↑ . (1979). Alien.
Terms FROm this POSt
- cafe
- Chances are the words you are reading were written in a small local cafe on a quiet morning with a hot cup of tea at my side. The places we work and create have a huge influence on what emerges.
- inner critic
- We’ve all got that voice inside us that casts a doubt on everything we even consider doing. It is the worst of our obstacles on the path to a creative life, and something no one can overcome on our behalf.
- inspiration
- A vague concept I mention frequently in my writing but rarely pause to define, I think the notion of being inspired is really at the foundational level, the seeds of creativity. Without inspiration, without muse, without spark creativity is just work or repetition or rote effort. Inspiration does not necessarily need to be monumental or epic or of the highest quality, but rather it is what is at the start of every creative process …until it flowers and drops more seeds of inspiration and the cycle repeats.
- science fiction
- I write this stuff. Or, I try to. Putting a finger on a definition for how to define this genre that encompasses everything from intergalactic alien space battles to insidious stories of near-future techno-dystopias… well, that’s more difficult. I read and watch a ton of this though, so you’ll almost certainly get some references on this project.
- the kid
- I joined the ranks of parenthood in the early 2000s and while I won’t claim to be some kind of parenting jeenius I did pay attention and learned alot about myself and the world through the perspective of trying to build, shape and release a child into the universe.
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