Comments on: The Great Scottish Novel http://www.todayiwrite.com/journal/the-great-scottish-novel.html (the psychology of writer's block) Sun, 20 Jul 2008 16:11:49 +0000 http://wordpress.org/?v=2.5.1 By: hollyjahangiri http://www.todayiwrite.com/journal/the-great-scottish-novel.html#comment-40 hollyjahangiri Tue, 24 Oct 2006 18:43:56 +0000 http://www.todayiwrite.com/the-great-scottish-novel.html#comment-40 "But sometimes the novel would stall because characters were talking around things without taking decisive action and without me making the effort to introduce stimulating plot developments." Like little wooden puppets, waiting for the puppetmaster, weren't they? (We worry about people who hear voices, but it's very disturbing - when you're a writer - to have the voices refuse to talk.) I actually had to threaten one of my characters during NaNo in 2001. He got pouty, because I went from first person (his) to third person limited omniscient - and he lost his starring role. He just wouldn't do anything for several days, until I started threatening to dress him up in his sister's clothes, or have the school bully beat him to a pulp, or - egads, here's the one that worked best - write him out entirely. Or make him an extraordinarily boring, minor character. I can't understand why people think writers are so odd, can you? :) “But sometimes the novel would stall because characters were talking around things without taking decisive action and without me making the effort to introduce stimulating plot developments.”

Like little wooden puppets, waiting for the puppetmaster, weren’t they? (We worry about people who hear voices, but it’s very disturbing - when you’re a writer - to have the voices refuse to talk.) I actually had to threaten one of my characters during NaNo in 2001. He got pouty, because I went from first person (his) to third person limited omniscient - and he lost his starring role. He just wouldn’t do anything for several days, until I started threatening to dress him up in his sister’s clothes, or have the school bully beat him to a pulp, or - egads, here’s the one that worked best - write him out entirely. Or make him an extraordinarily boring, minor character.

I can’t understand why people think writers are so odd, can you? :)

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