#newwriting – Joe the poet

Excuse Monkey

Been a while since I posted!!

I keep starting my blogs with this statement and I sound like the perennial ‘excuse monkey’

That sounds like an interesting thing to be and when this thought came into my head I decided to Google to see if such a thing existed?

It didn’t so I will now copyright that idea ©excuse monkey.

An excuse monkey will therefore be defined as a procrastinator who seems to have a monkey on their back and that is who they blame for not getting on with things.

However this isn’t why I started to write today.

I looked back on my last blog and have continued to write various pieces which I think I will put in my brand new, new book.

This isn’t a typo as I have new book which about to be published on Amazon (more about that later) but I will need to make a start on the next one.

Some more good news!!

We have celebrated my daughter (and son in law’s) wedding.
The local drama club have managed to perform their pantomime (late due to Covid 19)
We have survived COVID 19 infections in various family members.

I am feeling less pessimistic which is helpful as it means that I feel able write a bit more.

The new writing group has continued to meet and we have had some more people join us. The tasks have challenged me (for the positive) so for one, I took a risk and wrote a rap based on marriage.

I am seen as a mid 50’s rock loving guy (well I admit to listening to other stuff too) but RAP music is not normally in my ‘wheelhouse’

My weird inspiration was, whilst listening to Spotify I heard Buddy Holly and then Eminem in succession. These are not the usual combinations I listen to but I then put some of the words on paper/ my phone.

I initially shared what was written a fortnight ago and then wrote more ideas based on the constructive thoughts/ feedback (not harsh criticism) received from my fellow writers.

I then performed this rap at the latest Spoken Word (The Innerverse) on Weds 29^th and was given very positive feedback from the ‘experts.’ I plan to perform it again and this time I’ll do it much better!

Four weeks ago I took the plunge and delivered a workshop on Limerick Writing which stimulated others to write further limericks. Because of this I had to write a few new ones to share at The Innerverse. Again this was received very well. Nowadays I am being introduced as the “Limericks Expert” but I feel I have imposter syndrome about this but it is nice to know that I am able to share my knowledge/ skills to fellow writers.

I also spoke about contranyms which I illustrated by this old joke I DIDN’T share at the above wedding.

“When a man doesn’t have a partner he is incomplete, when he gets one, he is FINISHED”

A contranym is a word that can have opposite meanings dependant on the circumstances.

“To dust can either mean to add or to remove dust”

As I mentioned before, I have put the final (well almost) touches to my latest book.

Two years ago, my son in law wished me a happy birthday with the words “Joetry in Motion” and used the throwaway comment, that would make a good title for a book.

Well that is what I have used, so thanks Lee Hall (www.leehallwriter.com ) who is not the Lee Hall who wrote Billy Elliot.

I will publish the book over the next few weeks so keep a look out for notifications and hopefully you may want to purchase a copy.

Let’s see if I can keep up this effort and write something on this blog next week!!

Back Again

I just have not had the urge to write for ages. Well that is not strictly true, as I seem to be able to write a few poems and perform them at The Innerverse or at a new open mic that has opened up in my village.

I think what has happened is that the pandemic has robbed me of my urge or my routine to write every week.

I hope that now life is a little freer although I remain careful that my creativity will return.

Last night I attended a writers circle with a couple of people who I know.

it was newly set up and whilst there was only 5 of us, we shared a lot about our styles of writing, our influences and our likes and dislikes.

We all shared a piece of writing in progress and were offered praise and critique which in my case I found helpful.

We have a prompt for next time which I have started to put some words and feelings down on paper (well in my phone).

I have hopes that this will put me on an even keel again and I will be able to share my self to help others

The maxim you only get out what you put in applies as I like to feel useful as well as learning

Writing Again (part 1)

Hi all,

Photo by Andrea Piacquadio on Pexels.com

Sometimes you just have to get on with it when an ideas comes into your head.

I haven’t decided what kind of novel writer that I am because this is the first time that I have attempted to do so.

In my fantasy mind, I saw myself ‘splurging’ the words onto the page and all the ideas neatly forming paragraphs. I would then go back and edit.

The reality is that as I have written I have had so many ideas that I have had to stop and make a plan.

One tip I took on was to write the whole story in 100 words.

you then break the sentences up and write 100 words or so around each sentence.

I found that I could do some of this for some sentences and others just remained sentences.

I realised also that my story spanned decades with ‘flashbacks’ or explanations so I had to do a timeline whereby I worked out the age of each character at various parts of other characters lives. As wrote, I added to the timeline to ensure that I was able to ‘remind myself.’ I also have realised that I should have done ‘ biographies’ of each character which I could then use/ alter as I wrote.

Luckily this is informing me what sort of writer I am.

I am disorganised but am able to take myself by the ‘scruff of the neck’ and organise myself.

However you need to be able to have an initial outline of the story written down which you can then follow/ change as your book evolves. You should also keep a note of your influences (songs, tv programmes, pictures) so that you ensure that you are able to ‘describe’ the feelings they elicited for your writing. Some of my influences are songs I heard on the way to work which have ‘filled out’ the feelings of the characters’ or just formed part of the timeline of memories to describe the mood.

You need to remind yourself occasionally to check that some of the lyrics of the songs have not turned into chunks of dialogue to prevent plagiarising popular artists and getting yourself into trouble.

My immediate reflection so far is there is no formula for being a successful writer, or hard and fast rules. sometimes you may need to stop, take a deep breath and then review. you may be on the right track but retracing your writing steps may help you to find some beauty which got ignored as you rushed in.

So far 9 chapters named, an outline written, a timeline, idea for a cover. the book has 10,000 words which will be divided up again into the chapters.

When I have written a bit more I will share the title and the ‘blurb

Inspired by what?

Today I read a blog post on Twitter by another writer Jenny Quintana but originally forgot to save a link to it.

The theme of the blog was what to do to get inspiration for writing. The writer had 3 tips which she found useful to share.

As I write this I will try to remember what they were and how they helped.

Some of them I have unconsciously used myself

1 listen to a piece of music. This may stimulate a word that causes a trickle of others to follow.

I have done this a lot. Often when sitting in the car you suddenly hear the words differently and the song may generate an alternative story or even just promote a calmness from the maddening world around.

I have listened to musicians playing at an open mic and the atmosphere just caused the words to flow. What I wrote was nothing to do with what was happening around me.

2 look at a picture or piece of artwork and imagine where it is, what feelings it generates or describe the colours and properties which you feel others can’t see.

As per above I have allowed my imagination to run wild just clanging words here and there.

3 read a book and take a random words from 10 pages

I have also used a version of this by getting a CD cover and using the track listings as the words.

This created a powerful list which I turned into a poem.

4 this is one of my own

Just sit in silence and listen to what is happening around you.

Look at the sky and visualise the clouds and create a story around them.

I was amazed at what I heard as I sat in my garden. I heard the motorway, a train (don’t live close to a station) but then I heard water in a neighbour’s pond.

Picking up the sound can sometimes provide either the inspiration or allow you to think without distractions

Having looked much closer at my notifications I managed to find the link

https://t.co/8s6TOgJ4bl?amp=1

Her 3 tips were

Art and Music

Reading and using real experiences for example from newspapers to flesh out scenes

Doing something completely different