Metaphors for Writing

Writers use all sorts of metaphors to describe the writing process. My friend Sharon Mignerey sometimes thinks of it as a painting (and that she goes from one corner all the way across and I dab a litte here and there). But Sharon draws and paints.

Laura Kinsale recently called it unrolling a ball of golden thread.

Carol Berg calls it driving in the dark with headlights.

I really think of it as sculpting (I'm a predominantly tactile person). I have this pretty damn big block of white marble of a story idea and I start whacking away at it. Then I see veins. I feel the grain. I sense a shape wanting to be free.

Then you sand and buff and polish.

It's never quite as good as when you first hauled the block into the room to work on it, as the original sinuous and breathtaking form you sense inside, but it's as good as you can make it with time you have and your beginning/intemediate/advanced chisel and the fact it has cat hairs all over it....

May your skill equal your ideas today.
Robin