What inspires you to write?

Hothir-Ethelnor

Hothir-Ethelnor

New member
I was just thinking that it would be interesting to hear what all inspires you to write, whether it is another book, a movie, a song or something of that sort.

I am inspired by all sorts of things.

I was inspired to write my current story when I saw Reel around the Sun, for the first time done by Riverdance. I wanted to capture all my feelings as I watched that, so I began creating a culture that would have dances like that at festivals and such.

What inspires you?

You can talk about inspiration for a poem also, I won't mind. :)
 
i am inspired by movies, an experiece that may have happened to me or my imagination. i dont write stories on here but i do write them. i love to write romantic and comedy and even fantasy stories. i love to wrtie, my imagination can take me to places that i never knew i could go:eek: its great
 
I'm inspired mostly by books and dreams,...last week my friend asked me to write a story and I said I would if I could think of a topic. :p (I actually was sure I coudn't think of one)
And then two days ago I woke up and *plop* an idea came into my mind :D
 
Sometimes I am goaded to write something because of the feeling that someone else has gotten it all wrong. A specific example:

Many years ago, a sci-fi author named Tom Godwin wrote a story called "The Cold Equations." In it, a large starship is scheduled to drop off a smaller ship which has to bring desperately-needed medical supplies to a human colony on a recently-settled planet. The shuttle pilot, after leaving the mothership, discovers that a girl passenger of the mothership has stowed away on board, wanting to see her brother who is on the colony planet. But the effect of the girl's added weight interferes with the shuttle's ability to make approach; unless that burden is removed, the medical supplies will never arrive and _hundreds_ will die. So the pilot has no choice but to eject the girl to her death in space, to save many more lives.

Mr. Godwin made it sound oh-so logical; but examination shows that he _forced_ the situation in order to serve his agenda of promoting the "lifeboat mentality." Having served in the Navy, I can tell you that ship movements are subject to all sorts of inspections and safety checks; how much more so would it be for interstellar travel, _especially_ when lives were at stake with no second chance to get it right! No commander of a starship carrying passengers would EVER fail to make sure ALL passengers understood every safety issue, including what could happen if they stowed away on the shuttles. Nor would a shuttle go uninspected before launch.

(By the way, someone made a TV adaptation of the story. I never saw it, but a review said that they made a change, having the girl fight against being spaced instead of meekly submitting to it for the sake of saving her brother. Sounds like they pitted one aspect of political correctness against another aspect of political correctness.)

As a counterattack against the campaign to teach us that individuals are disposable, I wrote a story called "A Not-So-Cold Equation." In my story, essentially the same situation occurs; but instead of killing the girl, my hero found a way to save her AND himself AND the space colony. He cut off both of the girl's legs, and both of his own, cauterizing all the wounds. The four severed limbs, tossed out the airlock, were near enough to the girl's total weight that the ship was able to make it to the goal. The story was told in first person; and my hero's last words in the story, as he and the stowaway were both being cared for in the colonists' hospital, were: "Sometimes we can BEAT the damned equations, if we have the will to try!"


Joseph Ravitts, author of "Southward the Tigers: A Tale in the Days of King Frank"
 
For me, Byron on Wells is a real place, and writing is my way of spending time with its residents. I am in every sense of the word Mountebank Beaverlee. In every sense of the word, I derive a great deal of pleasure in having adventures with Buck and Bramble.

The mind is a vast and relatively uncharted territory. Don't settle in one place and make one small bit of you the whole world. And because you cannot bring all your mind to bear on the physical reality around you, your imagination is the only way you have to take "day trips" to the more exotic lands inside of you.

There are many kinds of intimacy. You become, to a small degree, intimate with an event when you learn of it. Just as I became aware of the Johnstown Flood. Then I wrote a story about a fictional character caught up in it. That act unleashed a flood of different emotions. You have not experienced the Johnstown Flood until you've searched the wreckage of your city looking for a loved one. For a moment, I had achieved a new level of intimacy with what was once a collection of facts. I had not only known it, I savored it and reacted to it.

An artist friend of mine put it rather succinctly when he was doing a watercolor of a puppy. Technique is fine and good, but to give it heart you need to feel that affection for the subject. "When I paint and I follow the curves and fill in the masses, it is a form of petting the dog. I feel like I am experiencing him more fully by internalizing all his details and expressing my feelings about them with my brush."

In one of my Byron on Wells stories I threw out the bit about how Bramble, a fox pup, usually swung his legs and shifted in his seat when he got "the fidgits." That is an affectionate little detail that comes from spending time with the character and regarding everything he does with a loving eye to detail. If you are focused only on the plot YOU CANNOT DO THIS. If you want your stories to pop off the page and live, you have to spend time with the character and notice the way they live, their mannerisms, their preferences and idiosyncracies.

Hope this helps.

ES
 
When i am inspired, it is usually by something of my own doing. Songs may help, a certian scene from a movie may stir an image, and a very good book can make my fingers itchy. My dreams can be very useful, at times, also. But what inspires me i think the most is my own emotions. I cannot write about a charecter until i feel what they are feeling. If they are mad, i wait until i am mad to write about them. If they are sad, then i wait until i am sad. I love my charecters. They do become real like ES said. They are, in esscence, different aspects of me (or what i wish i was.) I can relate. I can feel what they feel. I think they are my greatest inspiration, in themselves.
One thing that really helps is to constantly think about them--wonder how they would act in this situation, imagine randome conversations held with them, picture them doing any of the million things you have to do. Its fun.
 
hmm..music. The only music I listen to (and I am 100% serious) is Narnia. The music is beautiful and I always listen to it while I write. and books inspire me also.
 
Believe it or not I usually only write really good stuff (not the school assignment stuff) when I'm either really sad or if I was crying, I told you it's weird but it's true...
 
I'm just inspired by everything around me- I love observing all the things that surround me and how I can get a story out of them.

And like MagicElf, I love to listen to music while I write- it helps me to think more.
 
MagicElf said:
hmm..music. The only music I listen to (and I am 100% serious) is Narnia. The music is beautiful and I always listen to it while I write. and books inspire me also.
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Same here, I liten to slow and sweet music like FoTR counsiel track...can't remember the name. I think of a part in my book that would fit and then write it out. I would say a nice slow and gracful part or love part. I take the intrumental movements of the music and work them into my charaters. I am writting a book with 422 pages so far all hand written and that is what mainly helps me write. I also observe my family and friends and thier actions and work them into a charater. I take the thoughts from my head and put them into a good charater that would ''live them'' I also think up ways and imangon the people and places and what they look like. I just love writting, it is my T.V. and my movies that I think up.
 
Hothir-Ethelnor said:
I was just thinking that it would be interesting to hear what all inspires you to write, whether it is another book, a movie, a song or something of that sort.

I am inspired by all sorts of things.

I was inspired to write my current story when I saw Reel around the Sun, for the first time done by Riverdance. I wanted to capture all my feelings as I watched that, so I began creating a culture that would have dances like that at festivals and such.

What inspires you?

You can talk about inspiration for a poem also, I won't mind. :)
Click to expand...

I am inspired by movies and other books. And just normal, every day things.
 
I am inspired randomly, usually in my sleep.
My place of inspiration to sit at night is my bed, and in the day, especially in the spring and summertime, is the window seat in the alcove upstairs with the windows open.
 
Crunchine said:
I am inspired randomly, usually in my sleep.
My place of inspiration to sit at night is my bed, and in the day, especially in the spring and summertime, is the window seat in the alcove upstairs with the windows open.
Click to expand...

Oh yes! Dreams are a great inspiration to me, even the randomest weirdest ones.
 
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