There is a duality inherent in the writing profession: we aim to spread humanity and consciousness, and yet, there is a cognitive distance required to stomach writing's ruthlessness.ĭorothea Brande notices in her 1935 classic about the psychology and skill of writing that “The writer’s first task is to get these two elements of his nature into balance,” and she reassuringly adds that disassociation is not always psychotic. Each writer centers her eloquence on this simple symbol. Patti Smith's melancholy flow Woolgathering, spins a few nothings into a meditative work of emotional expressionism. Apropos of nothing, Agatha Christie once compared the incisive daydreams of Miss Marple to a process of "gathering wool." What a tremendous phrase, it made me gather a few more bits of wool: writer and teacher Anne Lamott also uses woolgathering to describe a daydream-like state that allows the subconscious to germinate creative ideas. This sweet little gem typing away - a bit of strychnine here, some mild garroting there - she heads to afternoon tea, bodies prostrate in her wake. A few streets from our home in London lived one of the most prolific murderers in history.
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