This makes me squeak a little with complete joy. I really... don't know if I have the capacity to comment because I'm so uneducated it hurts, but I'll try, okay? Yes. I'll try even though it's making my mind a little bendy.
I'm going to address your point of when a story starts to write itself, because I don't feel I know enough to really comment on anything else.
I never used to believe authors when I'd read an article in which they said something to the effect of "... and she just decided she wasn't going to die where I'd planned it and merrily threw a wrench in my outline and kept on living." I didn't believe people who said that their writing took on a life of its own and would start to do things, or that characters would make decisions without consulting them.
Clearly I wasn't writing enough. Or my characters simply weren't developed enough. Since I've come back to writing after almost a year away from it and several several years away from the world of fanfic, I find that my characters are (as ringprincess put it to me a few days ago) "breaking the fourth wall" so to speak.
They're making choices and doing things and I feel like I'm just sorta acting as the court reporter, recording everything they do and say and not putting my bias in at all. Okay maybe a LITTLE. ;)
I find your references to this Hillman guy interesting, that he talks about dreams as if they are their own people, sorta doing their own things and going throughout their own lives, and maybe our minds brush theirs for a few seconds each night. At least, that's what... I think of, when you write about him and his ideas.
Oh god, I totally can't remember where this comes from, but it was some maybe... exestensialist? maybe? belief that the world was operating on many different planes and when you lit a fire it didn't ignite because match hit sandpaper, bit it ignited because on another plane fire was coming into existance at that very moment. God, I wish I could remember where that's from.
I have no idea why this makes sense, but it does. Maybe it doesn't to you.
Narny narny nar
I'm going to address your point of when a story starts to write itself, because I don't feel I know enough to really comment on anything else.
I never used to believe authors when I'd read an article in which they said something to the effect of "... and she just decided she wasn't going to die where I'd planned it and merrily threw a wrench in my outline and kept on living." I didn't believe people who said that their writing took on a life of its own and would start to do things, or that characters would make decisions without consulting them.
Clearly I wasn't writing enough. Or my characters simply weren't developed enough. Since I've come back to writing after almost a year away from it and several several years away from the world of fanfic, I find that my characters are (as
They're making choices and doing things and I feel like I'm just sorta acting as the court reporter, recording everything they do and say and not putting my bias in at all. Okay maybe a LITTLE. ;)
I find your references to this Hillman guy interesting, that he talks about dreams as if they are their own people, sorta doing their own things and going throughout their own lives, and maybe our minds brush theirs for a few seconds each night. At least, that's what... I think of, when you write about him and his ideas.
Oh god, I totally can't remember where this comes from, but it was some maybe... exestensialist? maybe? belief that the world was operating on many different planes and when you lit a fire it didn't ignite because match hit sandpaper, bit it ignited because on another plane fire was coming into existance at that very moment. God, I wish I could remember where that's from.
I have no idea why this makes sense, but it does. Maybe it doesn't to you.
Anyway! I tried! XD