Welcome to my world and beyond...

A collection of snippets of the books I write and, occasionally, my life and the things that inspire my writing...

Monday, April 9, 2012

A to Z "I" is for Inspiration: Cinderella and Star Wars

Inspiration...let's see.  

When you write, when you paint, when you play music, when you design, create, tell stories...or just daydream, what is your inspiration? 

An oft asked question during an author interview is, "Who was/is your inspiration?"  And the answers are as different as the authors answering.  Yet, there seems to be a common thread running though the replies.  If the author writes scifi, the answer is generally a well-establsihed scifi author, or a scifi movie or TV series.  If the author writes romance, then the inspiration is usually a romance writer, a movie--or a romantic person in the real world.

For me, with my strange shape-shifting genre...I would have to say, Carl Sagan, Ray Bradbury, CJ Cherryh, Gene Roddenberry, George Lucas, Tolkien, the guys who wrote the 1960s television show "Lost in Space", and Charles Perrault.

Huh?  Charles Perrault?  Who is he and what is he doing on that list?

Well, your useless trivia for today is that Charles Perrault is the person most often credited with having written "Cinderella". Awe, go ahead and Google it. You will find dissension opined freely about who--among the over 3,000 version of Cinderella, was THE author. I am satisfied with Perrault.


But, who wrote it isn't the point.  That the author of a romantic fairytale is on that list, is.
I have read a lot in my lifetime, watched movies, been inspired by real life people and events,  but when it came time to set ink to paper, it was fantasy/scifi/romance that poured onto the pages.  My genre(s) chose me.


I suspect--but have no proof, that our inspiration as writers is seeded deeply within us at an early age.  The child who grew up reading Nancy Drew and The Hardy Boys, is more inspired to write mysteries. The kids who wanted to be cowboys,and grew up reading Zane Gray, lean a bit toward western in their writing-even if it is scifi.  Or, the child who was fascinated with crime reporting on television and newspaper, or watched detective series like Mannix, or Magnum P.I. ,grew up to write Crime Fiction.
  

It may not be a specific genre, like Nancy Drew lovers who write mystery--writing a plot (mystery) that they like over and over.  But instead, might be like the Zane Gray fans who write a character type over and over, returning to the image of the cowboy, the loner, the hero, to whom they felt a kindred calling?

Maybe I am just full of crap and have way too much time to think?  That's okay.  If our opinions differ, it is a reassurance that the world is a big, wonderful place full of diversity.


So, back to why I write fantasy/scifi/romance:

I cried every year when I watched this. It  was broadcast on network TV once a year from 1965 until 1974.
And then there was this one:
And this one:
*laughing*  What a mixed up bunch of inspiration.

People have given me advice, "Write what you know."  I thank them and smile, because I know that I write what I love.  
What about you?  Inspiration at a young age, relative to what you write now...
 

14 comments:

  1. I write what I love, too.

    Look forward to your challenge run…
    --Damyanti, Co-host A to Z Challenge April 2012

    Twitter: @AprilA2Z
    #atozchallenge

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    1. Thank you, Damyanti! Glad you get to write what you love. :-) Thanks for visiting.

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  2. Agree, agree! Write what you love! I grew up reading everything (compulsively, if it had words, I read it, from the back of a matchbox to the complete works of Shakespeare) but the old sagas, the tales of the various gods, plus the Moomins, and the old Grimm's gruesome fairy tales, if I had to narrow it down, that and being outside in wild places, that's what sparked my inspiration. Mr refers to my blog (kindly) as 'the weather report,' because of my attention to clouds :-)

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    1. "The weather report" ! I love it! Our Mr.s come up with some pretty funny observations. Lol...it must be tough, living with a writer. :-) Thanks for visiting. See you in a bit.

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  3. Oh wow, people, places, movies, music...can I just say everything is my inspiration. I love just observing things and getting inspiration from life. There is nothing like it!

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    1. Life--and all it contains. Nothing like it, indeed! Thank you for visiting and commenting, Deana! :-)

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  4. Fun post! Your blog looks terrific.

    Good luck with the rest of the challenge.

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  5. My inspiration is in observing the things around me and what I've grown up with. It all goes in the hopper and gets juggled around and comes out through my unique vision.

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    1. Yep...our influences never stop...and we do filter them through our own eyes. :-) Thanks for visiting!

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  6. Great post - I do agree about early influences but I must have read far too much and too diversely to have settled on just one thing. Think that's my general attitude to life too - little bit of lots of things - maybe if I focused I'd actually get somewhere ;o)

    Have fun with the challenge.

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    1. A well-rounded gal? :-) That is pretty neat... Without a doubt, it is beneficial to expose our children to different experiences while they are growing up. Your parents must have done a wonderful job! :-) Nice to "meet" you. :-) Thanks for visiting.

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  7. I probably hadn't seen that version of Cinderella since 1974, but as soon as they started singing, I did, too! Lost in Space was also a childhood favorite, Star Wars a teen favorite. Remember when you recorded top hits from the radio on your boom box cassette player? I recorded the Star Wars theme 21 times on one cassette! We share another love: I also write sci-fi/fantasy romance.

    Ok, back to work. Thanks for the fun with the A to Z Challenge.

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    1. Yes! Yes! :-) lol... Oh, and we always missed the first few seconds of each song. We were desperate to get to the "record" button. I think I had to press "Play and "record" at the same time to make it work. Oy! Those were the days, huh? :-) Thank you for visiting. Nice to "meet" you! :-)

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