Selling my Guitar

I was talking to a group of kids, parents and teachers recently (and lovely it was too) promoting The Poison Boy.  Their questions were at once engaging, unexpected (“What kind of car do you drive?”) and direct. On the spot like that, there’s no time to think – I just answered. Here’s a sample exchange which surprised me; not the question so much as my response. One lad asked, “What most helped you become a writer?” and I answered, “Selling my guitar.”

Bizarre. I hadn’t thought of that old thing – a Gibson Epiphone – for ages. I’d forgotten all about getting rid of it. I stuck it on Gumtree two years ago and a guy with plasters on his fingers and dubious personal hygiene arrived, strummed it in my front room for a bit and handed over the forty quid. After he’d gone I had to open all the windows.

I’d bought it just after university when I was in a band called – depending on the week – Idiot Jukebox, My Fat Friend, Barson, Stepford Robinson or The Cup of Tea. Most of my creative energy was channelled into song writing and the quality of outcome was, ahem, variable. Though, once we sent a demo off to Cog Sinister and I got a call back asking whether the band could support The Fall on their upcoming ‘Middle Class Revolt’ tour. I was so terrified I bungled the call; went mute – blew it. Progress was generally glacial and that phone call, taken one evening in my tiny flat on Northen Grove, was the closest we ever came to any kind of success.

But ten years later I still had the guitar and I still played a few old songs now and again. “Selling my guitar”, though. Why that? All of us have dabbled before; it’s a quality of childhood – the skateboard, the skis, the fishing rods and tackle collecting dust in the garage or attic. We are encouraged by our education system, by friends, by parents, to get quite good at twenty different things rather than expert at one.

Recently I was reading Neil Gaiman’s ‘Make Good Art’ speech, a commencement address to the students of The University of the Arts, and was struck by his frank admission: “I escaped from school as soon as I could, when the prospect of four more years of enforced learning before I'd become the writer I wanted to be was stifling.” Here was a guy with tunnel vision. No dabbling from Mr Gaiman. He goes on to say, “I had a list I made when I was 15 of everything I wanted to do: to write an adult novel, a children's book, a comic, a movie, record an audiobook, write an episode of Doctor Who... and so on. I didn't have a career. I just did the next thing on the list.”

There, succinctly, is the reason I sold my guitar. I didn’t have the courage or maturity to know it at fifteen, but at least I do now.

So clear out your cupboards, people! You ain’t ever getting any better at cross-stitch or watercolours. Put that trombone on e-bay; sell your saxophone to a smelly stranger. Ditch all the paraphernalia of the dabbler and dedicate yourself to the pen and paper.

Then, in the words of Gaiman, just do “the next thing on the list.”

A Question of Passion

A little while back on Twitter, Ian Rankin was bemoaning the quality of his debut, Knots and Crosses. “There’s hardly a page that doesn’t make me cringe” he wrote. I did the same as 30 other people; I smiled, retweeted, and spent a few moments feeling better about my writing struggles. 

A few days later, in the way these things often do, I found a neat little connection between Rankin’s gripe and another piece I was reading; Art & Fear: Observations On the Perils and Rewards of Artmaking by David Bayles and Ted Orland. (They discuss ‘art’ in general, but for the purposes of this post, I take it to mean writing.) In it, they are argue that one of the more painful experiences of a writer’s lot is the movement – gradual, dispiriting, repetitive… in short, pretty damn gloomy – from what they call naïve passion to informed passion.

This is the (significantly simplified) deal, according to these guys Bayles and Orland. Naïve passion is the hell-for-leather, carefree, up-and-at-‘em creativity of the  first-time storyteller. Stories explode from the pen; characters leap into life, plots are unfettered, diverse and ambitious. The whole process is fearless because the creator hasn’t assessed or analysed potential obstacles and so the outcomes, always breathless and energetic, can be by turn amazing or disastrous.  

But whichever way it turns out, you can’t keep hold of that naïve passion for ever. Once you’re done creating and the dust has settled, looking back from a critical distance you can often wonder how the hell you managed it at all. And so you move into another phase. “Naïve passion - which promotes work done in ignorance of obstacle…” write Bayles and Orland, “…becomes, with courage, informed passion, which promotes work done in full acceptance of those obstacles.” That, they argue, is the great leap forward the aspiring writer makes and, so they say, huge amounts of people stop creating during this period; they freeze up, curse their luck, cry writers’ block, in some cases put the pen or paintbrush down for good.

But gather round, people, gather round – for here’s the good news. One key conclusion is that novels get finished not by geniuses, but by those with enough dedication and bloody-mindedness to face down the daily challenges and doubts. Do that, and you move incrementally from naïve to informed.

Which is perhaps why Rankin can look back at his early work and wince; it’s the product of a different kind of passion, an earlier version of the passion he clearly still feels twenty-odd novels later. 

All I can hope right now is that I get even a quarter as far as he has, and one day have the chance to look back on The Poison Boy from some distant, marginally loftier position… and cringe.

Fletcher Visits an Old Friend

Square one! How nice to see you again. It seems recently that you and me have been drifting apart. Over the last few weeks in particular, I’ve been hanging out with some of your more distant cousins; squares twenty three and twenty four. They’re good, positive energising company, it feels like we’re going places and doing things when we’re together. They’ve got a fizzy whack of get-up-and-go, those guys, and I’ve had a blast with them. Such optimism, such vistas and views from up where they hang out!

Still, it’s nice to be back here with you, square one. In a sense, it feels comfortably familiar. We’ve spent a lot of time together over the years I guess. I notice a glint in your eye pal, and I know it’s because of that recent practical joke you played on me – you know, the one where you pack me off on a long journey with a length of invisible twine looped round my waist, so that just as I think I’m making progress I find myself bound taughtly to you and I’m forced to return. Rather than throttle you with it, I’ve decided to simply take it off and leave it here with you while we get comfortable in each other’s company again.

Yes, you can laugh all you like, square one, but remember this. In a couple of weeks I’ll be off again, and maybe this time I won’t be back. You, on the other hand, are always stuck here and the only company you’ve got are those who don’t even try.