Monday 29 September 2008

Spark

I've spent most of my life wondering just where the spark of creativity actually comes from. From the sky maybe? Coming down on rays of sunlight as in the engravings of Blake. From the ground, seeping up into our minds by some process of osmosis. From the air about us, blowing into our veins. From the back of the head, from the well of the mind, from that untouchable dark space within us all. The surrealists thought that Freud had discovered the truth. The unconsciousness was where everything began. That place of dreams and mist where chance and stumble created sparks.

They were probably right, I think.

Dream as good as consideration.
Discovery by flash of light.
Writing by starting the hand to move.
Writing by keeping moving.
Writing by staying the course.

Or maybe it's just as Flann O'Brien suggested it might be in his great novel, The Third Policeman. You become your bicycle by spending time sitting on it. I'm hard at it right now. I have a volume of Proust, heavy, in each hand.

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