Mercy! Mercy! That Dang Nabed PERCY!

The Role of the Libido in Artistic Endeavor

The Role of the Libido in Artistic Endeavor

In my exploratory writing on the Novella, Essence and the Stones two other stories spun off. The First was Bedelia, which has good potential and the other was Petra which at first blush looks to be a loser. I say that because it contains a male homosexual and a lesbian. Since this orientation comprises only ten percent of the population and tends to send the other ninety-percent into cardiac arrest it is at best a nitch audience, and unless someone shares that orientation is hard to write about convincingly. It also contains sensual prose and as I have explained in earlier blogs that is included to animate the writing in it’s early stage. The reason I am convinced it is a “downer” is that I see it evidenced in the ”Views.”

So this is a great story to experiment with. It is like working on a “Ho Hum” car model and trying anything you want without fear of ruining the basic raw material. So I have taken the vignettes I wrote, just as I did those in the Manny Hardin series and plunked them into the process.

I am showing this to interested readers to demonstrate the process. First in my port in the Petra folder are the raw vignettes. I mean this literally and figuratively because I didn’t hold back on the sensual prose. In earlier blogs I talked about imbuing writing with sexual energy and going back and editing it out later and still having it etched into the piece…. I know it sounds Da da da da….Da da da da… (Twilight Zone Music) but it’s something I’m thinking hard about…. (Don’t expect much) and it is tied into the art and science thing.

There are a lot of teachers out there, and other professionals for that matter, who think the science of writing (Teaching Writing) with all the testing and number crunching is stifling the art… I tend to believe that art cannot be taught, only encouraged, however the science can be definitely taught. Thus schools are a lot more into the science than the art of writing… Further as I have said on one or more occasions before, the science launches the art and the art elevates a manuscript into orbit.

This brings us back to what art is and the source of the germ which I believe is the engine of our creativity….I know! I know….nobody wants to hear it….OUR SEX DRIVE! What drives our creative energies is the old Libido and it is a chronic force that cranks out energy driving us to make little babies and the excess is diverted into other activities, of which writing is one in a host of many.

Yesterday I went in the WDC chat room for the first time in a very long time…I wrote a piece on the difference between prose and poetry called the “Chat room.“ that nobody but a few inquiring minds gave much heed to. Anyway yesterday I was bored and popped into one here and there were some young women talking at light speed and they touched on Hemingway and how he liked to take a break from writing in the spring and fish and chase women. I had heard that Hemmingway was inclined to single sex relationships however it appears from my eves dropping that he ran AC/DC.

What was interesting about the conversation was his belief, as explained, that he felt that having sex dissipated his creative writing energies. This is something I have heard before from athletes, such as boxers and track stars but I always associated it with physical activities rather than intellectual ones. My view has always been that most of us are frustrated enough with our sexuality that there is plenty of residual energy being thrown off by the alternator of our spiritual dynamo that there is plenty left over for other purposes.

I’m digressing I know and I’m sure you are wondering where this is all leading. It is leading to Step Two in my fandango writing process. Instead of talking in abstractions, I will post in my blog tomorrow, the outline for Petra, that includes the story thread, dramatic ingredients, and chapters, complete with a brief synopsis. For those out there who are interested and don’t feel inclined to take my class “The One Act Play,“ I am providing a do it yourself version of this important component to story telling, which I call “The Comprehensive Outline.“