Do Not Watch This Video

Alan Moore on writing and magick

Klint Finley

via http://mutateweb.com/archives/2005/02/16/alan-moore-on-writing-and-magick/

New Alan Moore interview:

AM: I’ll give a brief recap in case we feel we missed anything. Magic and language are practically the same thing, they would at least have been regarded as such in our distant past. I think it is wisest and safest to treat them as if they are the same thing. This stuff that you are dealing with – words, language, writing – this is dangerous, it is magical, treat it as if it was radioactive. Don’t doubt that for a moment. As far as I know, the last figures I heard quoted, nine out of every ten writers will have mental problems at some point during their life. Sixty percent of that ninety percent – which I think works out at roughly fifty percent of all writers – will have their lives altered and affected – seriously affected – by those mental problems. I think what that translates to is – nine out of ten crack up, five out of ten go mad. It’s like, miners get black lung, writers go bonkers. This is a real occupational hazard. There’s plenty of ways to go bonkers, some of them a lot quieter, some more insidious than others – drink, heroin, there’s lots of other sorts of things – but this is dangerous – we’re dealing with the unreal. You’re dealing right on the borderline of fact and fiction, which is where our entire world happens. We’re living in a world of fact and we’ve got our heads full of fiction, the characters that we’ve invented for ourselves – we’re all writers, we all invent characters for ourselves, roles in this little play that we’re running in our head that we call our lives. With a writer, you’re dealing with the actual stuff of existence, you’re playing the God game. All the things that you will have to consider before you write a story are exactly the things God had to consider before he created the universe – plot, characters (laughter) and what’s it mean, what’s it about, what’s the theme here . . . motifs. A lot of them suns, they’ll do, we’ll put them everywhere – hey, snakes! These are easy . . . (laughter).

http://www.enginecomics.co.uk/interviews/jan05/alanmoore.htm

Jack Kerouac’s Essentials of Spontaneous Prose

Via http://www.languageisavirus.com/

SET-UP
The object is set before the mind, either in reality. as in sketching (before a landscape or teacup or old face) or is set in the memory wherein it becomes the sketching from memory of a definite image-object.

PROCEDURE
Time being of the essence in the purity of speech, sketching language is undisturbed flow from the mind of personal secret idea-words, blowing (as per jazz musician) on subject of image.

METHOD
No periods separating sentence-structures already arbitrarily riddled by false colons and timid usually needless commas-but the vigorous space dash separating rhetorical breathing (as jazz musician drawing breath between outblown phrases)–”measured pauses which are the essentials of our speech”–”divisions of the sounds we hear”-”time and how to note it down.” (William Carlos Williams)

SCOPING
Not “selectivity’ of expression but following free deviation (association) of mind into limitless blow-on-subject seas of thought, swimming in sea of English with no discipline other than rhythms of rhetorical exhalation and expostulated statement, like a fist coming down on a table with each complete utterance, bang! (the space dash)-Blow as deep as you want-write as deeply, fish as far down as you want, satisfy yourself first, then reader cannot fail to receive telepathic shock and meaning-excitement by same laws operating in his own human mind.

LAG IN PROCEDURE
No pause to think of proper word but the infantile pileup of scatological buildup words till satisfaction is gained, which will turn out to be a great appending rhythm to a thought and be in accordance with Great Law of timing.

TIMING

Nothing is muddy that runs in time and to laws of time-Shakespearian stress of dramatic need to speak now in own unalterable way or forever hold tongue-no revisions (except obvious rational mistakes, such as names or calculated insertions in act of not writing but inserting).

CENTER OF INTEREST
Begin not from preconceived idea of what to say about image but from jewel center of interest in subject of image at moment of writing, and write outwards swimming in sea of language to peripheral release and exhaustion-Do not afterthink except for poetic or P. S. reasons. Never afterthink to “improve” or defray impressions, as, the best writing is always the most painful personal wrung-out tossed from cradle warm protective mind-tap from yourself the song of yourself, blow!-now!-your way is your only way-”good”-or “bad”-always honest (“ludi- crous”), spontaneous, “confessionals’ interesting, because not “crafted.” Craft is craft.

STRUCTURE OF WORK

Modern bizarre structures (science fiction, etc.) arise from language being dead, “different” themes give illusion of “new” life. Follow roughly outlines in outfanning movement over subject, as river rock, so mindflow over jewel-center need (run your mind over it, once) arriving at pivot, where what was dim-formed “beginning” becomes sharp-necessitating “ending” and language shortens in race to wire of time-race of work, following laws of Deep Form, to conclusion, last words, last trickle-Night is The End.

MENTAL STATE

If possible write “without consciousness” in semi-trance (as Yeats’ later “trance writing”) allowing subconscious to admit in own uninhibited interesting necessary and so “modern” language what conscious art would censor, and write excitedly, swiftly, with writing-or-typing-cramps, in accordance (as from center to periphery) with laws of orgasm, Reich’s “beclouding of consciousness.” Come from within, out-to relaxed and said.

Writing A Great Script Fast In A Nutshell

Follow along with this fast and easy step-by-step process for thinking up a great script or story idea! Learn how to brainstorm for film ideas that fit your skills, interest and production platforms. Take that new film idea and learn how to add a visual theme, plot points, character traits, twists, metaphors/symbols, conflict/obstacles, setups/payoffs, suspense, humor and much more! Based on the book “Developing Digital Short Films” (2004 Peachpit/Pearson) by Sherri Sheridan. This class is perfect for digital filmmakers or animators using DV, 2D and/or 3D. Download the Nutshell Workbook for this free online screenwriting class at www.MindsEyeMedia.com or www.MyFlik.com. You can also just use some paper or a notebook to follow along with the step-by-step process, but the Workbook has long lists of ideas for each step to help you think up new ideas fast. This 90 minute “Writing A Great Script Fast In A Nutshell” class is part of a 20 hour DVD workshop that takes you through a start to finish screenwriting process in about 20 hours. “Writing A Great Script Fast” the 20 hour DVD workshop is available at the above websites.

The Writer’s Journey and Mythic Structure with Christopher Vogler

Christopher Vogler, author of the international best-selling book THE WRITER’S JOURNEY explores the powerful relationship between mythology and storytelling for screenwriters, scholars, and fans of pop culture.

a zen fool’s notebook

an extended glimpse into the art and philosophy of a zen fool, poems in the creative stage, drawings, insightful quotes from past thoughtful minds . . .

Visit site for some excerpts http://stores.lulu.com/store.php?fStoreID=1904618

Writing Down the Dreams

Looking back on my dream diary, I begin to see a pretty clear message emerging. What is more, there are some real great materials emerging as well. Rich imagery, archetypes, strange story lines. . .

What I am getting at is that if you work with the material in your dream diary, you have a great resource for writing ideas or writing prompts.

Drawings and images feed the writing process

ut of the flesh of our mothers come dreams and memories of the Gods. Of other kind than the normal inducement of interest and increasing skill, there exists a continual pressure upon the artist of which he is sometimes partially conscious but rarely entirely aware. he learns early or late in his career that power of literal reproduction (such as that of the photographic apparatus) is not more than slightly useful to him. He is compelled to find out from his artist predecessors the existence, in representation of real form, of supersessions of immediate accuracies; he discovers within himself a selective conscience and he is satisfied, normally, in large measure by the extensive field afforded by this broadened and simplified consciousness. Yet beyond this is a region and that a much greater one, for exploration. The objective understanding, as we see, has to be attacked by the artist and a subconscious method, for correction of conscious visual accuracy, must be used. No amount of visual skill and consciousness of error will produce a good drawing. A recent book on drawing by a well-known painter is a case in point; there the examples of masters of draughtsmanship may be compared with the painter-author’s own, side by side, and the futility of mere skill and interest examined. Therefore to proceed further, it is neccesary to dispose of the “subject” in art also (that is to say the subject in the illustrative or complex sense). Thus to clear the mind of inessentials permits through a clear and transparent medium, without prepossessions of any kind, the most definite and simple forms and ideas to attain expression.

Notes on Automatic Drawing

An “automatic” scribble of twisting and interlacing lines permits the germ of an idea in the subconscious mind to express, or at least suggest itself to the consciousness. From this mass of procreative shapes, full of fallacy, a feeble embryo of idea may be selected and trained by the artist to full growth and power. By these means, may the profoundest depths of memory be drawn upon and the springs of instinct tapped.

Yet, let it not be thought that a person not an artist may by these means not become one: but those artists who are hampered in expression, who feel limited by the hard conventions of the day and wish for freedom but have not attained to it, these may find in it a power and a liberty elsewhere undiscoverable. thus writes Leonardo da Vinci:-”Among other things, I shall not scruple to discover a new method of assisting the invention; which though trifling in appearance, may yet be of considerable service in opening the mind and putting it upon the scent of new thoughts, and it is this: if you look at some old wall covered with dirt, or the odd appearance of some streaked stones, you may discover several things like landskips (sic), battles, clouds, uncommon attitude, draperies, etc. Out of this confused mass of objects the mind will be furnished with abundance of designs and subjects, perfectly new.”

From another, a mystical writer, “Renounce thine own will that the law of God may be within thee.”

The curious expression of character given by handwriting is due to the automatic or subconscious nature that it acquires by habit. So Automatic drawing, one of the simplest of psychic phenomena, is a means of characteristic expression, and if used with courage and honesty, of recording supconscious activities in the mind. The mental mechanisms used are those common in dreams, which create quick perception of relations in the unexpected, as wit, and psycho-neurotic symptoms. Hence it appears that single or non-consciousness is an essential condition and as in all inspiration the product of involution not invention.

Automatism being the manifestation of latent desires (or wishes) the significance of the forms (the ideas) obtained represent the previously unrecorded obsessions.

Art becomes, by this illuminism or ecstatic power, a functional activity expressing in a symbolical language the desire towards joy unmodified-the sense of the Mother of all things-not of experience.

This means of vital expression releases the fundamental static truths which are repressed by education and customary habit and lie dormant in the mind. It is the means of becoming courageously individual; it implies spontaneity and disperses the cause of unrest and ennui.

The dangers of this form of expression come from prejudice and personal bias of such nature as fixed intellectual conviction or personal religion (intolerance). These produce ideas of threat, displeasure or fear, and become obsessions.

In the ecstatic condition of revelation from the subconscious, the mind elevates the sexual or inherited powers (this has no reference to moral theory or practise) and depresses the intellectual qualities. So a new atavistic responsibility is attained by daring to believe-to possess one’s own beliefs-without attempting to rationalize spurious ideas from prejudiced and tainted intellectual sources.

Automatic drawings can be obtained by such methods as concentrating on a *Sigil-by any means of exhausting mind and body pleasantly in order to obtain a condition of non-consciousness-by wishing in opposition to the real desire after acquiring an organic impulse towards drawing.
The Hand must be trained to work freely and without control, by practise in making simple forms with a continuous involved line without afterthought, i.e. its intention should just escape consciousness.

Drawings should be made by allowing the hand to run freely with the least possible deliberation. In time shapes will be found to evolve, suggesting conceptions, forms and ultimately having personal or individual style.

the mind in a state of oblivion, without desire towards reflection or pursuit of materialistic intellectual suggestions, is in a condition to produce successful drawings of one’s personal ideas, symbolic in meaning and wisdom.

By this means sensation may be visualized.

first published in FORM MAGAZINE Vol. 1 No. 1, April 1916

thank you to http://www.hermetic.com/spare/auto_drawing.html for this particular version

Odyssean Inferno

by D. M.

Grasping the pen in need of something, anything to pull you up and make sense out of life’s struggles, some reason to go on and some place to go on to. Tennyson turned to poetry at an early age, due to an unhappy home life. His writing skills enable him to cope well with the dark moments of life. Tennyson’s choosing the mythic hero Ulysses as the speaker of his poem “Ulysses” is key to its interpretation and help in carrying him through the pain and loss of his close friend.

Andrew McCulloch points out that, “From early childhood, poetry was intensely important to Tennyson as a refuge from his extremely unhappy home life” (McCulloch). This refuge in poetry was sought as Tennyson drafted “Ulysses” while “waiting for an Italian ship with its dark freight to bring Hallam’s body home to England. Images of dark seas, doomed vessels and death pervade the text (Martin 185-186). The same year that Arthur died, 1833, Tennyson’s brother Edward was admitted to a mental asylum. “In 1839, Alfred and Emily were officially engaged. By 1840, they were officially unengaged. Emily’s father had put a stop to the match, supposedly because Alfred was too poor to marry” (MacLeod).

The real reason for the separation is more likely that Tennyson’s opium addict brother Charles drove Emily’s sister to her eventual collapse, strongly affecting feelings toward Alfred Tennyson (MacLeod). Tennyson opposed opium use to the point of commenting on it in his poem “Lotos-Eaters,” but his “gypsy look, long hair, watery wide eyes–along with his artistic temperament, habitual pipe smoking, and trance-like imagery, all lent themselves to his unwelcome characterization as a possible drug user” (Platizky) After their separation, Tennyson threw himself into traveling and studying, becoming proficient in several languages (MacLeod).The earliest surviving complete stanza that exists from Tennyson’s youth was written when he was around the age of eight,

Whateer I see, whereer I move
These whispers rise & fall away;
Something of pain, of loss, of love,
But what, twere hard to say (Martin 22),

This piece already indicates that at a very young age, a profound connection with his emotions has already been established, already acquainted with pain and loss and love. “The emotional crisis of Hallam’s death along with other unfortunate life circumstances encouraged and allowed Tennyson to find a public place and voice for what had, until then, been an essentially personal art” (McCulloch).

Writing about ones emotions, illness and traumas has a beneficial effect on ones health (Positive Psychology Center). Writer and therapist Kate Evans MA, BSc reports, “the rhythms of poetry stimulate the part of the brain which governs emotion. Being forced to put these emotions down on paper brings about a kind of order and control” (Evans). To illustrate an example from “Ulysses,”

Tennyson loved to create sonorous, high-sounding verse, particularly by setting different vowel sounds closely against each other. The style is often intensely slow moving and languorous, and parts of the poem need to be read in a slow or chanting voice: “The long day wanes: the slow moon climbs: the deep / Moans round with many voices” (University of Buckingham).

Another poetic device Tennyson uses is the taking on of someone of a different time and who is older in years. He could be “assuming the voice of old men to stress a weary sadness” (qtd. in Davis). Taking on the voice of this ancient hero could act as a bridge to Ulysses’ wisdom, strength and experience. Tennyson may be setting up a relation ship or situation in the poem that is analogous to one that he is experiencing and that he wants to see from a different point of view, identifying his events with the events that are going on in Ulysses’ life. Perhaps this exercise can give him distance, strength and insight into his life situation.
Evans speaks of the benefit of the publishing step of writing, while supporting the previous point,

To move from therapeutic to truly publishable writing, however, can be a big step. The art of adapting for a market, editing and re-working is a difficult one to learn especially when it feels like the words have been squeezed from your soul. It can be a valuable experience. Taking another person’s point of view, for instance, can be a way of getting another perspective on what is going on in your life (Evans).

A poet of Alfred Lord Tennyson’s stature, who has won high titles by his writing, Poet Laureate and baron, is surely well skilled in the publishing step of writing and aware of any benefits that the publishing stage has to offer. The publication of a poem that gives honor and respect to a Homeric hero is in keeping with the traditions of the aristocratic warrior society that Ulysses was a part of and that Tennyson perhaps feels a part of with his circle of friends, A. H. Hallam having been one of them.

Dante’s Inferno Canto 26 was a source that Tennyson used for Ulysses as well as Homers Iliad and Odyssey. Dante, being Roman offers a less than flattering image of Ulysses, but Tennyson takes much from Dante’s account and gives Ulysses a more positive spin. Ulysses is in Dante’s inferno for a number of reasons, his insatiable desire for knowledge and seeking for new and unknown things and places are a few. The Romans had a less than flattering view of Ulysses the “dreadful” as he was the trickster who thought up the device which led to their defeat at Troy (Rosenberg).

In Tennyson’s poem, Ulysses represents strength, experience, leadership (lines 13-15), coming to terms with old age and his abilities, self-awareness (49-53), recognition of his skills and role in society (1-6, 33-43). He has synthesized experience into wisdom and knowledge and thirsts for more (18, 31-32), he desires to go on with life without pause and to be useful (1-5, 22-23,30-32), and he represents the epic quest of life to the point of chasing his own death (57-70). The above all are traits that can be drawn from Tennyson’s “Ulysses.”

Anne Hudson Jones notes that, “most people choose the archetypal myths of battle, journey, and death and rebirth in writing their pathographies” (Jones). A pathography is an accounting of ones illness, a somewhat new genre that is catching on and becoming very popular. The University of Buckingham observes that Tennyson’s poem “Ulysses,”

has been a favourite of explorers and mountaineers, and other people who have pushed themselves to extremes. Ulysses has fought his way through the ten years’ Trojan war, and experienced huge adventures on the way to his island home of Ithaca (University of Buckingham)

One element of the poem that seems to have been overlooked in its possible translations is when Ulysses addresses his mariners. Which mariners is he addressing? It seems from the poem, that he is addressing the companions who battled with him at Troy and accompanied him on his journey home. According to Homer, these mariners all died on their way home. Why would he be speaking to dead mariners? Does Ulysses represent Arthur already dead, on his last voyage west, beyond the Pillars of Hercules (44-70)?
“The long day wanes; the slow moon climbs; the deep
Moans round with many voices. Come, my friends,
‘Tis not too late to seek a newer world” (55-57).
Whose voices do the deep moan round with? Are the drowned mariners calling out to Ulysses? Might Arthur be calling his friends to seek a newer world? There are eerie images of night sea journeys into the unknown, “Beyond the utmost bound of human thought,” suggested through out this poem (Rowlson).

What did Tennyson say the poem is about? Asking the author would be the simplest way to gain insight into a poem,

“It was partly his attempt to come to grips with grief, to speak about the need to keep going with the struggle of life. As he said himself: ‘The poem was written soon after Arthur Hallam’s death, and it gave my feeling about the need of going forward and braving the struggle of life.” (University of Buckingham)

The number of interpretations that this short poem has illustrates the great thing about poetry. “A poem may simply be running through ideas or emotions, expressing multiple viewpoints at once, never coming to any particular conclusions. Poetry doesn’t have to mean anything, it can be an exercise in creativity, a coping tool or something that someone just does” (Davis).

Tennyson’s was not an easy life and he likely worked through a lot of his troubles through writing. His choosing of Ulysses was key and relevant to his coping at time in his life. His life circumstances at the time of composing the poem are key to the understanding of why he wrote it.

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