| > romantic idea that art is divinely inspired I certainly believe that is true. When I do my best work (programming, not poetry) I feel like I was inspired.
I always get inspired in the same way, by doing the hard work for as long as it takes, and that usually feels like torture. Perhaps Adams and Bukowski use a simmilar method to each other, but is just presented differently. > Charles Bukowski: > if you have to sit for hours
staring at your computer screen
or hunched over your
typewriter
searching for words,
don't do it. > if it's hard work just thinking about doing it I read this as "if you don't want to do it, then don't", not as "If it is hard work then don't do it". Thinking about doing it, and doing it are different things. I really don't believe that any world class writer (or world class anything) got inspired before doing the hard work first. That is a romantic idea, not the inspiration itself. |
Then recently I sharpened my knife for 2 hours straight, and somehow managed to write something that seemed to be relatively divinely inspired (compared to my usual crap).
There might be a pattern where some kind of physical/mental exhaustion would induce the people into a trance like state under which inspired worked could be “channeled” through.
I use these mystical terms somewhat loosely, but I would say that after an actual channeling experience (not very successful but one nonetheless) the act of writing feels weirdly similar to the point that I suspect they could share some similar processes underneath.