Ice Sun Wind
…a cold, blue light enters the window I feel enveloped in sap, or as if a clot of sap but also down the throat, into the lungs, sludging along tributaries, cold sap, and I was going to write–jacked on Coffee3–but now I will write little.
How does the weather affect your work?
An anecdote: One year Norman Mailer decided to winter in Provincetown. While this locale is famous for authors and their doings (and undoings), most everyone agrees you do not purposely winter in the region. Mailer knew this, but wanted to be alone, to focus on a novel. He got no writing done. Why? As he put it, in a bit of word-play: “You must watch your drinking.” He then explained that he found himself miserable, unproductive, and eventually reduced to sitting in front of a tall mirror, pouring bourbon into a glass, and staring into his face–In a phrase: watching his drinking.
Annie Dillard thinks the spring will actually enter your words, that, “The desk and chair float thirty feet off the ground, between the crowns of maple trees.” She opens her writing room to breezes through French doors. She seems to see the weather as conductive, the warmth driving the words on the page.
Hemingway, in A Moveable Feast, says a cold, blustery day in Paris helps him write about a cold, blustery day in Michigan. (He then orders rum.)
I have heard others say the opposite. To actually remove from the situation, in all ways, to write about the situation.
But doesn’t the cold somehow seep into the Russian writers? And heat in the South American? But now I talk generalization, or some attempt at analysis, denotation versus connotation, Place, really, and I wanted to ask about craft. Mid-summer I would order beer A, light, golden, crisp. Midwinter, I would beer B, dank, murky, dark. But I would drink beer. And I think the weather affects the activity of writing.
Or maybe all of this happens inside, the walls, the room, the room of the skull, so who cares the weather?
You?
Tags: Norman Mailer, Weather Ways
I had a week off work between xmas and new years. I had grand plans. I had a chapbook ms I wanted to finish. I had a week off work, and made sure I had no plans beyond the standard familiar holiday goings. I was going to write, damn all.
At our house, we’ve a programmable thermostat; it sets at 65 during the day. That week, it was in the single digits outside. I refused to adjust the thermostat for the sake of pennies; I was reduced to a pile of blankets. I got nothing done.
Now you see that warm will always triumph because cold is dumb.
I had a week off work between xmas and new years. I had grand plans. I had a chapbook ms I wanted to finish. I had a week off work, and made sure I had no plans beyond the standard familiar holiday goings. I was going to write, damn all.
At our house, we’ve a programmable thermostat; it sets at 65 during the day. That week, it was in the single digits outside. I refused to adjust the thermostat for the sake of pennies; I was reduced to a pile of blankets. I got nothing done.
Now you see that warm will always triumph because cold is dumb.
snuggie + fingerless gloves = your ms completion despite the single digits
snuggie + fingerless gloves = your ms completion despite the single digits
but the opposite is true in Florida. Summers (most of the year) are so muggy and hot you can’t think. You refuse to think about anything. In the airconditioning it’s sterile. And you’re stuck. Winters in Florida are somewhat better, though this winter is rainy and cold in an unfamiliar/west coast-y kind of way.
I have a tinge of the seasonal affect. Not enough sun=nothing gets done.
but the opposite is true in Florida. Summers (most of the year) are so muggy and hot you can’t think. You refuse to think about anything. In the airconditioning it’s sterile. And you’re stuck. Winters in Florida are somewhat better, though this winter is rainy and cold in an unfamiliar/west coast-y kind of way.
I have a tinge of the seasonal affect. Not enough sun=nothing gets done.
if it’s cold outside, I sit in a hot tub (w/ a beer) to handwrite. pruning can be a problem, and maybe some blurred pages, but the work gets done.
when it’s hot, I go to an air conditioned pub. (same potential downsides apply — plus some bonus features — but the work gets done.)
of course, all of this “work” refers to brainstorms, notes, first drafts and revisions. hardcore writing rarely happens in these environments. but any writing leads to the finished work. so… perhaps we just need to adjust our expectations to meet the vagaries of the weather???
if it’s cold outside, I sit in a hot tub (w/ a beer) to handwrite. pruning can be a problem, and maybe some blurred pages, but the work gets done.
when it’s hot, I go to an air conditioned pub. (same potential downsides apply — plus some bonus features — but the work gets done.)
of course, all of this “work” refers to brainstorms, notes, first drafts and revisions. hardcore writing rarely happens in these environments. but any writing leads to the finished work. so… perhaps we just need to adjust our expectations to meet the vagaries of the weather???
I got a snuggie as a gag gift from my wedding. I tried it. It lacked fortitude.
I got a snuggie as a gag gift from my wedding. I tried it. It lacked fortitude.