onward and forward

In the past few weeks, more people have joined our community. I'm taking this activity as a sign that people are thinking about this year's NAPLWRIMO and are getting themselves prepared.

I just wanted to take a moment and talk about some of the changes that have taken place over the summer. Most importantly, NAPLWRIMO's founder, lead Rhino, cheerleader-problemsolver- elemental-force, Dorothy Lemoult has made a tough decision. I'm sure most of you who have partipated in NAPLWRIMO know that for the past few years she has been focused on getting her degree in Drama therapy. Through that process, her focus and direction have shifted and, as much as she loves and supports us here, she has realized that she no longer has the energy and time to continue organizing the event. So she has graciously handed the reins over to me with blessings and good wishes for taking it further. I'm grateful for Dorothy's trust in me and for the opportunity to continue the work she started here.

NOTE: Even though she has stepped back a bit, she is still advising and guiding me as I get up to speed on how it all works on the back end.

I've participated in NAPLWRIMO since it started and have been a huge believer in the event and the community that has developed around it.  My goal is to continue to nuture this community and create a space where we can support each other as we work. I'm currently deep into writing my masters thesis and with any luck I'll be turning in a draft this week. I'm also in the process of writing a first draft of a play (which I've been commissioned for and which was started during NAPLWRIMO!)

I'm looking forward to this year's event and am starting to gear up for it. My plan right now is to start posting here at least once a week and sharing some of the things that are serving as sources of inspiration while I'm writing.  Please feel free to comment and share anything that is particularly inspirational for you.

And please join us for NAPLWRIMO 2010! Woot! Woot!

Elizabeth

p.s: here's a little something that really grabbed hold of me and got me writing yesterday. If you haven't checked out The Rumpus, you are missing out!

This is the first of our weekly "Rhino Burst *" in which an experienced playwright rallies us to the cause . This week's "call to arms" comes to you from 2007 and 2008 NaPlWriMo participant, Ben Ellis.

Welcome to the second week.

Oh God. What have I done? I had this great idea and the first ten, even twenty, pages went brilliantly, and… and… all of a sudden I feel like I've run out of juice. I'm a goose. What's going on? I should give up. I'm terrible. I thought I had a whole play in me and I'm sputtering now… And I've got the laundry to do. And I've got to get a haircut. I haven't spoken to my family for weeks. I ought to do the shopping. There's a pile of papers I need to sort. Oh, look, the bathroom needs vacuuming. Or a mop. Hell. Let's do both.
Everybody gets this feeling around about now. Whether they are writing in November or not.

Do not fear. It's normal. In fact, what's great about it is that it's necessary.

What is happening right now is that you are writing a first draft. At first, you get excited and run on the initial juice of the excitement. Right now, you might be having an excitement hangover. You're a little sluggish. You have no idea what the next scene is going to be; or if you do have an idea, you think the idea's a bit crap, so you might as well play Solitaire for a few hours, until you feel better. Or find a better idea.

Again. Do not fear. This is a normal and necessary feeling.

Why is it necessary? Because what's happening is this: your writing process from play to play may be consistent, but every play is different, and you are learning how to write this play. You learn how to write this play… by writing it. It's just that the seasoned playwright knows this, whereas the unseasoned give up.

Without doubts, confusion and bafflement, there is no point in learning. If you don't feel doubt or confusion or bafflement at this point, you'd better hurry up and get with the program! Get baffled and confused!

Let me tell you what I'm assured by the friend of a friend of a friend is a true story. It comes from a philosophy major at a university in Canberra who was a bit of a stoner. He was worried about taking his final exam for the year, and so he decided to relax himself – banish the feelings of doubt and anxiety – by smoking a large spliff before heading, red-eyed and optimistic, into the exam hall.

When the exam paper turned up, no problem. He saw the question and knew, just knew, that he had all the answers he needed. So he started writing his essay, and as he was writing it, he started thinking to himself, "My God, this is a great essay. This is the best essay I have ever written. This is a brilliant response." All the way through he kept thinking this as he wrote.

He left the exam hall elated. He thought he'd cracked some pretty major theoretical codes in there.

A couple of weeks later, the professor in charge of the department calls him.

"I'd like you to come in and see me," he says to the student.

"Why's that?" asks the student.

"I think we need to have a little discussion."

Brilliant, thinks the student. So he makes an appointment see the professor, thinking that he'll be asked to convert the essay into a journal article. Or be given the philosophy award. He's excited.

He sits down across the desk from the professor, who starts, as the student expects, by saying, "this is about your exam paper." The professor holds it up. He hands it to the student. "Could you explain this?"

The student takes the paper and opens it up. He reads what's in front of him.

My God, this is a great essay. This is the best essay I have ever written. This is a brilliant response. My God, this is a great essay. This is the best essay I have ever written. This is a brilliant response. My God, this is a great essay. This is the best essay I have ever written. This is a brilliant response.

Pages of it. That's all he wrote.

How does this relate to you and your month-long quest to write a first draft? Your sudden feelings of inadequacy?

It relates because you need feelings of doubt to write a play. You need to learn how to write this play. If you thought you know everything, you'd end up writing the play version of the stoner's philosophy exam.

You'll have characters who are nagged by doubt. Share your own doubts with them. Has something come up for you? Share it with your play.

Can you be more precise about what it is that worries you? Why not write down a list of questions? Once you have this list, why not re-arrange it in order of lowest to highest anxiety?

You might just have the order of the questions that your play needs to confront scene by scene.

As a playwright, you never sit down knowing all the answers, otherwise what would be the point of writing your play? If you're full of doubt right now, you're 90% of the way to being a proper playwright. The other 10% is milking your anxieties for to help you apply your bottom to your chair, pen to paper, fingers to keys.

But most of all, now is not the time to judge your work. To think right now that "this is the best play ever" or "this is the worst play ever" is the stoner's philosophy. Best of all, procrastinate when it comes to judging your own work. Leave it for another day. Keep putting it off. Write something instead, knowing that you're putting this important work of judging your material until the last. As long as you keep writing and learning, you'll get around to judgement some day or other…

Actually, more importantly, what you are learning here is how to create in the face of anxiety. You're doing it with imagination and with your own resources. You've also got the NaPlWriMo community there to help you out. Your mission - imagination triumphing fear - is the kind of small, beautiful act that the world needs. I need you to imagine a future despite your doubts; you need me to do it too. That's part of the essential reason human beings make art. The act possesses its own nobility.

So, if you feel stumped right now – and I always feel stumped around this point of the process – congratulations. You are well on your way. Make your coffee to celebrate, make your lists of questions and keep going.

*A burst is the sound that an adult rhino makes, though it is barely audible to human ears. A baby rhino on the other hand makes a squeak.

Ben Ellis is a Gippsland-born playwright and columnist now based in London. His recent work includes an adaptation of Franz Kafka's The Metamorphosis for a Sydney Theatre Company and Malthouse Theatre (Melbourne) co-production (2005). His Poet No. 7 was selected for the 2006 Dublin Fringe Festival after its premiere in London in February 2006.
Currency has published three of his plays: Falling Petals which attracted furious debate in Australia—including fist-fights among audiences—for its depiction of an unsentimental and hypocritical rural community; These People, concerning Australian responses to the stories of asylum seekers in detention centres in their deserts; and Post Felicity, a black comedy which satirises the obsessions of baby boomers which won both the Patrick White Play Award and the inaugural Malcolm Robertson Prize.
He blogs at http://parachuteofaplaywright.blogspot.com