Ask the Author: Tot Taylor
Answered Questions (6)
Tot Taylor
I don't usually have a problem with WRITERS BLOCK as I view writing, or putting words together, even in very long-form as more of a 'flow' event. I really only write when I have flow and feel it coming. So, I can't start at 6am and finish at 3pm like most writers seem to. It's the same process I have applied to creating music - i. e. re: sitting down at the piano. I don't even sit down unless I have something. The first 60-70 pages of 'THE STORY OF JOHN NIGHTLY' were written in one sitting like that (then 'worked'). The writing - the actual words as they appear on the page - are usually in my head while I'm walking the streets or doing something else, hoovering or something. It's always been like that. I'm lucky in that words - and music - have so often come to me fully formed. I realised as a teenager early on that what we are trying to do when we try anything creative is to 'make something happen'. If the song, or the painting, or the garden, or the cake isn't 'happening' then forget it. It's that magikal energy thing, that 'comet hit' etc, which we need to be happening when the 'fabric' comes down, that 'golden ribbon' referred to in the novel. Thank you for asking... Tot Taylor
Tot Taylor
simply, the writing is a combination of so many thoughts and ideas I've had over a long period of time about 'creativity' in general and about individuals being 'creative'. Sometimes of course that may mean 'destructive'. By applying that thinking to a fictional character set within a group of disparate characters, 'misfits', the characters seemed to live for me in a particular world and I was able to look at and discuss various situations and circumstances via the central figure of JOHN NIGHTLY. I hope the story will resonate with people who have both 'tried to succeed' and have 'succeeded in trying', and also with those who have failed of which there will be many. Though you do achieve a certain amount by 'failing' of course. In the novel John Nightly experiences both. Thank you for asking, Tot Taylor
Tot Taylor
There isn't very much good about being a writer. It's a lot of hard work and a lot of hours. More and more hours. It's a lot of sitting - unless you're speaking into a dictaphone. I did a bit of that too. I also acted out the moment in the book - when they were in the kitchen, which they were a lot, and I did some drawings of the place, the fame, the house, the cliff, Black Cliff, the music-studio, the computers etc.
Then after it all - when you actually get this thing finished - in my case after 10-12 years, you may not even have anything. You don't really know. Just like when you complete a film. You've done all the stuff but you just don't know. Is it good? Is it right? Film directors and film producers don't know and neither do the actors and actresses and all the tech people. They just have to show it to the audience. Then they know!
With a novel it's just you. And... some of that 'knowing' is in the hands of that very big looming figure - The Reader. Hopefully your 'friend'. I realised when I was writing 'John Nightly' that I would be in a better place if I could be 'reading' the book at the same time as I was 'writing' it. (If indeed it was me that was actually writing it - I'm not sure about that either). But when I hit that frame of mind - put myself in that mode - I'm writing the words on the page, but I don't know what they are. They're just coming. They're not planned in my brain. They 'appear' - as in when you're reading. Then the experience became better, softer, and also the actual completed 'writing' was better.
After that, book completed, I guess the glib answer would be...
To be read - then to be re-read.
Thank you for asking...
Then after it all - when you actually get this thing finished - in my case after 10-12 years, you may not even have anything. You don't really know. Just like when you complete a film. You've done all the stuff but you just don't know. Is it good? Is it right? Film directors and film producers don't know and neither do the actors and actresses and all the tech people. They just have to show it to the audience. Then they know!
With a novel it's just you. And... some of that 'knowing' is in the hands of that very big looming figure - The Reader. Hopefully your 'friend'. I realised when I was writing 'John Nightly' that I would be in a better place if I could be 'reading' the book at the same time as I was 'writing' it. (If indeed it was me that was actually writing it - I'm not sure about that either). But when I hit that frame of mind - put myself in that mode - I'm writing the words on the page, but I don't know what they are. They're just coming. They're not planned in my brain. They 'appear' - as in when you're reading. Then the experience became better, softer, and also the actual completed 'writing' was better.
After that, book completed, I guess the glib answer would be...
To be read - then to be re-read.
Thank you for asking...
Tot Taylor
I just wait until I have 'flow'. That means - as far as I can see anyway - that something is 'happening' on the page which is the most important thing about writing, in my opinion. Just like a piece of music. Less 'composed' than simply 'appeared'.
Tot Taylor
Only one thing's for sure. Nothing will happen unless you've written something. Get writing. Then perfect it.
Tot Taylor
'The Story of John Nightly' was originally inspired by the many, many ex-pop stars (or 'people in the music business') who had a very swift rise to fame and in so many cases an even swifter fall from grace. The same applies to any artist, those in the visual arts, writers, architects, professional gardeners. Anyone who, post-fame, experiences a (very) long 'fade out'. I wanted to write about what they might be doing for the rest of their lives - i. e. very often fifty or sixty years in oblivion.
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