David B. Coe February 20th 2009

More on Creativity (With Thanks to Kate Elliott for the Inspiration)

Building on Kate Elliott’s wonderful post about creativity (2/18/09)….

I’m an author by profession, but I believe that creativity plays far greater role in my life than my writing career can encompass.  I’m a photographer as well.  I’ve had my own exhibit, I have work hanging in a local gallery, I’ve sold work to magazines, and I’ll be the featured artist at an event near where I live later this spring.  I take my photography quite seriously, in part because I find that creating a visual image is so different from telling stories.  I can’t lay the groundwork for a photograph, I can’t weave backstory and establish motive (or motif!).  With a photo I have one scintilla of a second to capture an image, and either that image tells a tale, or not; either it captures a viewer’s imagination, or not.  And yet at the same time, I also believe that photography informs my writing by making me more observant, by forcing me to look both at the big picture and at minute details.  I think my descriptive passages have become better since I began taking my photography more seriously.  They’ve become leaner, more directed; they tie in better to my storytelling than they used to.  And I think that my storytelling has made me a better photographer, by forcing me to think of image in terms of narrative rather than something more static.  A picture should tell a story, it should convey something to the viewer beyond, “Oooooh, pretty!”

I’m also a musician.  I play guitar and sing, I’ve even written a song or two.  I play when I need a break from my work.  I’ll take time off in the middle of a day of writing to noodle around on the guitar or belt out a song in my empty house.  But music is more than a break from writing.  Music has taught me a great deal about pacing, about dynamics, about rhythm.  A good book, I believe, needs all of these things to work.  It needs to breathe in and exhale.  At times a story needs to maintain tension, like a musical note that refuses to resolve.  And at times, even in the middle of a story, readers need that sense of resolution, even if it’s ephemeral.  Sometimes we need to write frenetic scenes, and sometimes we need softer passages, to give our readers a chance to catch their collective breath.  Writing is musical; books are like symphonies.

I love to cook:  another creative act.  I find that writing a book and cooking a vat of chili are similar acts of creation.  I start with a recipe, and I follow it loosely.  But I also improvise, adding peppers here, a dash of wine there, and letting it simmer a good long time so that the flavors blend and complement one another.  I don’t really need to explain the analogy, do I?

Let’s try another one.  I think my most creative endeavor on a day to day basis is parenting.  I have two daughters, one is almost 14, the other is closing in on 10.  They are similar to each other in some ways, but quite different in others.  And with each new day they face new challenges in their lives and present me with new challenges in mine.  Shepherding them through their childhoods and adolescences is one of the great joys and great challenges in my life.  In the same way, I find myself managing characters everyday, refereeing their interactions, trying to keep one from taking over the story of another.  Every book is different, each new story is filled with new personalities.  And yet, I know them all so well.  I have to be willing to let them grow; I have to nurture their individuality.

Creativity comes in so many shades, tones, flavors, guises.  We live and breathe it.  It informs every aspect of our lives.  My wife is a scientist, and doesn’t think of herself as being especially “creative.”  Yet, I’m amazed every day by the innovation she brings to the classroom, and I know that I could never come up with the ideas that form the basis of her research.  Creation, I believe is hardwired into the human mind.  And I would argue that every act of creativity is linked to every other one.  Learning to improvise on my guitar has made me a better cook.  Taking pictures has made me conceive of my writing in a different way.  And I think that writing has made me a better parent.  Writing stories, creating characters — these are exercises in empathy.  We have to understand people’s motivations and emotions.  We have to step outside of ourselves and assume the perspectives of others.  What could be a more valuable skill for the parent of a teenager? 

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