When I stood for Parliament in 1979 (Tiverton, Labour!) I knocked on his door. All I had was Hughes, E. on the electoral register so I had no idea who lived in this little cottage.
He just said 'no thankyou' and closed the door on me. I stood there trying to say 'blow me, you're that Ted Hughes' - but just a load Ums and Ers came out. Ho Hum.
All the time and especially with Hughes. I still love his work, though, and I know that reading it closely will eventually have a positive effect on my writing.
Wow well-wisher, not even something like Heaney's "Death of a Naturalist" or Hughes' "Thought Fox" or his "Full Moon and Little Freda"? No matter, we each have a muse. I suppose the same thing is evoked in you by the older maestros.
The thing is when I look for inspiration it often leaves me with a huge feeling of inadequacy and the idea of self delusion. Then I tell myself 'listen scratch, Ted Hughes was a genius poet laureat; get a grip' and stop comparing a diamond with a lump of coal'.
Emily Dickinson is another one for me. She just seemed to breathe poetry and all her little poems
manage to be amazingly profound in a Zen Haiku way that I can never achieve.
How do you get that wisdom that great poets have?
Good point WBK. I enjoy reading poetry to a point, then get bored. I would feel guilty about boring others, but something has to be read to bore someone. I don't know what the hell inspires me. Mainly music, film, some (bits of) novels and dreams. And the strangest thing of all: real life.
I love Peter Porter's 'Your Attention Please'; a classic of the cold war era. It reminds me of the TV movie "Threads" and the animated movie "When The Wind Blows" and really gets across the absurdity
of Nuclear war.
When I was a teenager, and hadn't written a single creative word, I wanted to grow up to be Alice Munro. I'd still like to do that, but I realise it's not going to happen. So I've settled for just being me, and churning out my own rubbish. I know I'm not a great writer, but I do think of myself as a writer. Not every musician gets to be a great mega super star. Thw world is full of talented session musicians, and people scraping a living doing what they love. I've lowered my expectations. But I still get inspired by writers I think are really good, and try to learn from them. I'm rambling. I will stop now.
Oh look, a link. I wonder where it leads.
JoHn
Oh look, a link. I wonder where it leads.
JoHn
Parson Thru
Parson Thru
Oh look, a link. I wonder where it leads.
JoHn