Another Flavor of Inspiration? Ambrose Bierce and the Empty Field

So yesterday I attended a session of prompts and readings, the object being to inspire imagination.  But many are the roads to creativity with, semi-serendipitously discovered today, an essay by Ted Gioia, “Were Ambrose Bierce’s Ghost Stories Inspired by Undiagnosed Agoraphobia?” offering one alternative method:  the mining of one’s own fears.  Bierce, one may recall, was author of THE DEVIL’S DICTIONARY as well as such short stories as “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” and (for science fiction horror fans) “The Damned Thing.”  For more one may find the essay itself on CONCEPTUAL FICTION.COM, brought to us courtesy of Robert Dunbar via Facebook’s LITERARY DARKNESS, by pressing here.