Spotlight Link: Find your inner daemon!

[Evans]

I knew that the concept of an innner spirit fueling a writer's words was nothing new, but I had no idea of the history and depth of the idea until I happened by chance upon an article by writer Dan Simmons on that very subject.

The concept of an inner force influencing a writer's thoughts is one that comes to my mind naturally from time to time, especially whenever a new fully-formed story pops into my head from seemingly nowhere.

I even found the idea interesting enough to make it the subject of my debut short story, Whatever Possessed You?. It was a subject I hadn't seen discussed in much detail before, but I can't say that any more after reading Dan Simmons' article!

Folks, prepare to break out your dictionaries and get yourself educated.

(Warning: this article will make you feel stupid.)

Link: http://www.dansimmons.com/writing_wel...

[Dustin]

Wow, I love Dan Simmons! Thank you for sharing the link, Evans!

[Angie]

Nick cave is always referring to his muse, in everything he does be it music books and film. So his works really good for him. I was amused at the deamon in Stephen king, because that's one successful pairing.

[Evans]

I am definitely a muse-based writer. The stories just come to me and I write them down as best I can. There's a lot of criticism about writers that depend on a muse, and the dangers of putting yourself at the mercy of a muse, but I don't really care. That's how it works for me - and fortunately, I've captured enough stories from my muse at this point that if I never had another inspiration I'd still have enough to keep me writing for the rest of my life. My main challenge is deciding which of my many, many outlines to start bringing to life next.

[Angie]

I got that impression from the explanation you wrote about how your stories come to you. I actually think muse based work is fascinating. That ideas come to you, do you sleep with a pad next to you for when ideas come to you in the night, or do you try to work it so it's mainly in the day?

I can't understand that you would get crisized from having your ideas coming that way. Do you have to work in silence or do you listen to music.

[Evans]

I'll scrawl down an idea when it hits me on the closest thing available, but the notepad app on my phone has been an amazing tool for collecting ideas, can even dictate verbally into it, and then have everything backed up automatically into a Dropbox folder ready to access on my computer when it's time to begin writing in earnest.
Other times I might wake up in the middle of the night from dreaming an amazing dream and scratch it down on a pad on my desk and hope it makes sense in the morning. CRY BABY happened like that.
If I'm doing a marathon writing session, I'll usually have some music playing. If only for an hour or two, or editing, usually not.