LIFE-WRITES: Exercise of the Intellect

“Everybody walks past a thousand story ideas every day. The good writers are the ones who see five or six of them. Most people don’t see any.” Orson Scott Card

Having dispensed with the nuts and bolts side of creative writing, we are now going to study the intuitive, imaginative and off-beat aspects. We are going to explore what I’ve called:

Creative Pathways For Writers – the 10 Secret Steps

1. There are more ideas locked away in your unconscious mind than you could ever write about in a whole lifetime – but how can they influence your creative writing. The secret is finding the key to access them.

2. There is a story (article or poem) behind everything you encounter during your daily routine in both inner and outer worlds if you have the courage to experience and explore. The secret is learning to look behind the obvious.

3. No matter how mundane and/or familiar a scene, there are countless different angles from which to view it. The secret is thinking ‘sideways’.

4. You are unique: no one can access the same experiences and memories, which means you have the ability to generate unique responses to situations. The secret is knowing how to express yourself.

5. Creative energy fuels creativity, so immerse yourself with creative images and stimulating art forms to give fresh ideas and ignite the creative flame. The secret is tapping into whatever can unleash creative energy.

6. Encourage the flow of creative energy from your unconscious mind through visualisation, meditation and relaxation. The secret is drawing energy from other sources.

7. Use your imagination when exploring other artistic mediums such as painting, sculpture, music, etc., because creativity is a state of mind. The secret is allowing other influences to stimulate the creative impulse.

8. Give your imagination free rein and open up your unconscious mind to the creative possibilities around you; if necessary do the opposite of what is considered the norm. The secret is having the strength to dream.

9. By connecting to your unconscious mind you can explore the wealth of universal memories of myth, fantasy and symbolism – but don’t be embarrassed by your ability to travel to the ‘hidden’ world. The secret is channelling your favourite childhood images.

10. Certain images or symbols open the door to the collective unconscious; try working with these mind pictures to stimulate your creativity no matter how ridiculous or outrageous at the beginning. The secret is focussing the mind on those things that will encourage creative energy.

Multiple & Simultaneous Submissions

Let’s have a word about multiple and simultaneous submissions. The only instance when it’s permissible to make multiple submissions is for poetry, when editors will often request that

writers send up to six poems at a time. Send two or three unsolicited short stories or articles in the same envelope and they will probably go straight in the bin.

The question of simultaneous submissions is a lot more complex, so let’s use an analogy before we start. Just suppose a market gardener was told that he could only sell one box of lettuce to Tesco or Wal-Mart at a time; and that these would have to be sold and eaten before he could sell another box to another supermarket chain. It wouldn’t make for good business and his stock would be well past its sell-by date by the time he could offer it elsewhere. The same applies to writers’ submissions. Some editors state quite openly that it can take between 3-6 months before they will give a decision, so what are our options?

• All submissions should be tailored-made for the appropriate market and shouldn’t automatically suit another editor’s requirements. All typescripts would need some tinkering before being sent to another editor, so simultaneous submissions are not a good idea from the writer’s point of view.

• By rule of thumb, give short stories, poems and articles a month before offering them elsewhere. Novels and nonfiction book proposals should be given between six to eight weeks before sending them off to the next publisher/agent on your list. Give them the courtesy of another six weeks to

respond.

• A ‘perhaps’ ‘later’ ‘maybe’ response is no good to a writer. Keep your options open by all means, but a piece isn’t sold until you have a formal confirmation.

The ‘no simultaneous submissions’ rule was put in place over two decades ago by publishers and editors, and has become another of those urban myths within the creative writing industry. It’s dog in the manger stuff and if you’ve been waiting for weeks, or even months, for a reply, then it’s hardly ‘simultaneous’ if you decide to submit to someone else after a reasonable delay. If your submission is accepted, do send a polite letter to any editor who’s ‘kept it on file’ and explain that the piece has now been sold. And thank them for their time. You never know when you want to submit to them again.  One response I’ve noticed that it relatively new is: “If you have a request from another agent/publisher for the full manuscript, please email us and let us know.”  In other words, we might have overlooked something good and it gives us the opportunity to steal a march on the other agent/publisher who might not realise there’s competition in the offing!

The only real no-no for simultaneous submissions is when submitting material for a writing competition. Because there is often a 3-6 month lapse between the competition being announced and the closing date, be prepared for your entry to be on-hold until after the judging process has taken place. Generally speaking, however, material entered for competition, particularly short stories, would not be the sort of fiction normally written for commercial publication, since it tends to be more adventurous and non-genre specific.

Every submission should be tailor-made for its intended market.