The writing exercise we did last class led me to figure out a writing block of mine. When we were given the three wants on paper, I didn't have any problem constructing characters and various stories from these clues. The place where I got stuck was trying to decide on a setting. Such a simple thing, and yet it stumped me. It turned out that the setting helped dictate the story and the characters, and that's why it troubled me so much.
Then I remembered this idea for a story I had a few months back. I checked out some books at the library on the subject of the piece, and I had a slew of ideas around my basic concept. However, I never wrote the story because I was plagued with indecision as to where to set it. The setting would affect the entire feel of the play, and I felt I needed to pick the perfect location or else my story would fall apart.
Last night I returned to this idea of mine, and decided to just play around with it for a second. I find that I only really get rolling on ideas right as I drift off to sleep, which is inconvenient but the most liminal time for my mind to wander. I think also reading Oscar Wilde's comedy inspired me to write. I made a little play in paragraph, divided into three acts. It used my initial concept, but I was able to take my abstraction of a very grandiose topic and pin it down to a play, featuring 3-4 rooms in a single house. Initially I thought I couldn't even write this as a play because I wanted so many locations and characters.
This may seem simple and insignificant, but I felt I overcame a problem I had as a writer in this discovery. I had been acting solely as an editor and censor of my work, mainly as a censor, so that I ended up writing nothing. I have been more forgiving of myself, so that if I do have a shitty first draft, at least I have something to springboard from. I'm really happy I'm building up a notebook of mini-plays so that I will have these ideas to return to and flesh out if there's any potential there.
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