Post: #1

Original Source: http://www.theatlantic.com/health/archiv...ty/379486/

Quote:How Environment Can Boost Creativity
Dim lighting and ambient noise may lead to more out-of-the-box ideas.
CODY C. DELISTRATY

It took F. Scott Fitzgerald nearly a decade to finish Tender is the Night, his semi-autobiographical novel about the physical, financial, and moral decline of a man with nearly limitless potential. While working on the novel, Fitzgerald and his wife, Zelda, moved between France, Switzerland, and the United States, eventually spending eighteen months at La Paix, an old country house north of Baltimore that he rented while Zelda was treated for schizophrenia at a nearby clinic. The Turnbull family owned the estate, and Andrew Turnbull, who was 11 at the time, later recounted Fitzgerald’s stay in his biography, Scott Fitzgerald.

While at La Paix, Fitzgerald worked in dark, disheveled rooms with a bottle of gin in a nearby drawer. He took short walks and came back to hand-write his ideas on notepads scattered on his desk. He also loved to sneak the Turnbulls’ homemade wine.

“Dazed and wan, he shuffled about the shut-in, unwholesome house in bathrobe and pajamas, pondering his next move,” Turnbull recalls in the book. “Returning to his study, he penciled [his thoughts] down in his rounded, decorous hand on yellow legal-sized paper. Interrupting him at work, I remember the illumination of his eye, the sensitive pull around the mouth, the wistful liquor-ridden thing about him.”

"A short story can be written on a bottle, but for a novel you need the mental speed that enables you to keep the whole pattern in your head."
Part of the reason it took Fitzgerald so long to finish Tender is the Night was Zelda’s worsening condition. But you’d think that his haphazard, alcohol-fueled creative process wasn’t doing him any favors, either.

Yet recent research has shown that messy, dark, noisy, booze-filled environments like the one Fitzgerald cultivated at La Paix can, in fact, help stimulate creativity.

Darkness and dim lighting can encourage freedom of thought, which leads to a more prolific generation of ideas, according to a recent paper in the Journal of Environmental Psychology. Specifically, dim lighting downplays a room’s distractions, promoting focus on internal reflection and the work at hand.

The next question is whether to keep that work on a tidy or a messy desk. While a writer in a time crunch might prefer a clean desk (reducing clutter can help people focus), one small study found that working amid disorder helped people come up with more creative ideas.

Kathleen D. Vohs, a professor at the University of Minnesota Carlson School of Management and the lead researcher of the study, writes, “Being creative is aided by breaking away from tradition, order, and convention and a disorderly environment seems to help people do just that.”

Evidence also supports the habits of people who eschew a desk altogether, instead opting to work in a coffee shop. A little bit of ambient noise (between 50 and 70 decibels—the average noise level of a coffee shop) slightly disrupts the mental process, which one study showed to help people engage in more abstract thinking during a word-association task. A high level of noise, however, around 80 decibels—the sound of a dishwasher or garbage disposal, for instance—becomes so disruptive to information processing that it becomes hard to think at all.

Like a few notable modern creatives, such as Donna Tartt, Quentin Tarantino, George R.R. Martin, and Neil Gaiman, Fitzgerald also wrote by hand, only moving to his typewriter for final drafts. Though few people actually do it anymore, writing by hand can help with idea generation, learning, and memorization.

Other studies have shown that taking walks, or working in rooms with high ceilings, can promote divergent or abstract thinking.

Another tip: Get a little tipsy. Moderate intoxication—a blood alcohol content of about 0.075—improves problem solving and leads to what participants in the Consciousness and Cognition study referred to as “sudden insights,” which the sober participants reported significantly less often. That’s not a blanket license to get drunk on deadline, though. In a December 1934 letter to his Scribner editor, Maxwell Perkins, Fitzgerald wrote about the necessity to moderate his own drinking: “A short story can be written on a bottle, but for a novel you need the mental speed that enables you to keep the whole pattern in your head.”

Though few people do it anymore, writing by hand can help with idea generation, learning, and memorization.
Fitzgerald completed Tender is the Night while at La Paix in the autumn of 1933 just before his 37th birthday. By that time, he had seen his wife fall deeper into mental illness, his father passed away, and he suffered a tubercular hemorrhage that left him bedridden and unable to work for weeks. Having seen his own star slowly fade after reaching his pinnacle of fame so early on with This Side of Paradise when he was only 23, with Tender is the Night, he strove to regain the faith of the public and his faith in himself.

He used his own feelings of professional failure for the tragic character of Dick Diver; he used his disappointment with his parents for Dick and Nicole’s failed relationship; he used his affair with Lois Moran for Dick’s affair with Rosemary Hoyt; and he used the stinging reality of his wife’s illness and the memory of her affair with Edouard Jozan for Nicole’s illness and affair with Tommy Barban.

In a letter dated November 9, 1938, Fitzgerald wrote to Andrew Turnbull’s sister, Frances, who was a sophomore at Radcliffe College, and had sent him one of her first attempts at writing fiction.

“You've got to sell your heart, your strongest reactions, not the little minor things that only touch you lightly, the little experiences that you might tell at dinner,” wrote Fitzgerald.

This is what Fitzgerald believed was the key to a meaningful creative project. Perhaps all these little “life hacks”—the lighting, the noise levels, the alcohol—can help, but your environment can’t sell your heart for you. As Fitzgerald concluded his letter to Frances, “[Writing] is one of those professions that wants the ‘works.’ You wouldn't be interested in a soldier who was only a little brave.”

Interesting stuff to think about. I recently started writing by hand again. Will try the dim lights and somewhat noisy environments - I do recall getting good mileage writing in bars.

The only thing that bothers me is the note on alcohol, though, as I quit drinking a couple months ago. I've definitely written some awesome stuff while buzzed.

That said, I have read that alcohol, while good for short-term creativity, can destroy your creativity in the long run. I also think you could get similar results from notropics, coffee, or a puff on a joint. Maybe even some strong tea to get the ball rolling.

"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. To be your own man is a hard business. If you try it, you'll be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself." - Rudyard Kipling

Post: #2

Alcohol certainly doesn't help me, it actually kills my motivation to do anything.

Having lots of body energy helps me a lot. I just went jogging this morning and soon as I arrived home, I wrote 800 words in 20 minutes for my book. I am sure that if i didn't go jog today, I wouldn't even write one word.

Writing by hand helps a lot too specially when I am in a public place, if I am at home, I will just use the laptop.

Post: #3

^ Yeah, I find that going for a walk usually gets my creative juices flowing. I carry a notebook with me everywhere I go, and while walking is when I often pull it out to jot something down.

"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. To be your own man is a hard business. If you try it, you'll be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself." - Rudyard Kipling

Post: #4

Considering that something like the first 8 Nobel Prize winners for literature were alcoholics, I'm not sure that recommending alcohol to writers as creativity-fuel is a great idea.
Fitzgerald died at 40 (I think) drinking.

Note: My comment is aimed at the author of the article, not the OP.

Post: #5

^ Agreed.

In fact, a lot of writers struggle with booze and drugs because they're afraid of losing their "edge." It's a big problem in the industry.

Tied to the high suicide rate among authors too, I'd imagine.

"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. To be your own man is a hard business. If you try it, you'll be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself." - Rudyard Kipling

Post: #6

What about this infographic about beers and coffees?

Post: #7

Alcohol used to calm my nerves live nothing else playing on stage in a band. Plus my brother is a severe alcoholic. That is why I avoid it.

Post: #8

I have long felt I work better on paper. Whenever I try to write anything on computer, I look for a distraction. Maybe George R R R R Martin has the right idea by using an old computer that cant access the internet. Im surprised there hasnt been a mass marketed writing tablet or netbook that is not internet enabled.

Post: #9

Alcohol worked for Bukowski.

Post: #10

Stumbled upon this while looking for some tips on writing copy.

I had a small epiphany a few days ago. I have never really had an insightful thought while I have been sitting still, especially sitting in front of my computer.

All my deep introspections seem to come when I am on the move, usually walking. My mind races when I am walking through the city streets, especially at night. Some pretty divine shit just pops into my head.

The gym, and the shower are also great places.

My struggle is capturing that lightning in a bottle.

Post: #11

I'm a former alcoholic and alcohol was great for some live shows as i had pretty strong stage fright, which is not a good thing when you are the frontman.

On writing two songs on particular...Once i was the only guy in the house who was awake late one night when in my head i started hearing this song that i hadn't written lyrics to yet. So i put the book down i was reading, got up, and went to the rehearsal room. Put a tape of the song in a boom box and about 10 minutes later it was a wrap,

On another song i was at work and was waiting in a hotel lobby waiting to be picked up by a coworker when the riffs of a song we had went through my head. I pulled a paper napkin and a crayon out of my pocket and in one go wrote all the lyrics with no need for revisions or changes.

First thought, best thought, sometimes works.

Post: #12

(11-28-2014 07:52 AM)The Reactionary Tree Wrote:  Alcohol worked for Bukowski.

Bukowski was a great writer. But not the only great writer.

Not to mention that as much as I love some of his stuff, he was an asshole and a clown too. I don't think anyone but the blindest of drunks would call him a positive role model to emulate. Not if they got a glimpse of who he was anyhow.

(01-05-2015 07:36 PM)General Mayhem Wrote:  Stumbled upon this while looking for some tips on writing copy.

I had a small epiphany a few days ago. I have never really had an insightful thought while I have been sitting still, especially sitting in front of my computer.

All my deep introspections seem to come when I am on the move, usually walking. My mind races when I am walking through the city streets, especially at night. Some pretty divine shit just pops into my head.

The gym, and the shower are also great places.

My struggle is capturing that lightning in a bottle.

I carry a notebook with me at all times. Now that I finally broke down and got a smartphone sometimes I use my recorder on that as well.

Every creative streak in my life is marked by scratching lyrics, poetry, and other writing on random bits of paper. When I used to wait tables for a living I'd come home with pockets full of them, and when I had an hour-long commute to work every day it was often interrupted with me scribbling in a fury by the side of the road.

These days I make sure I'm always prepared and have a stack of fresh notebooks sitting on a desk so I can stock up whenever the current one is full.

"The individual has always had to struggle to keep from being overwhelmed by the tribe. To be your own man is a hard business. If you try it, you'll be lonely often, and sometimes frightened. But no price is too high to pay for the privilege of owning yourself." - Rudyard Kipling

Post: #13

This is interesting. A hookah bar during the day(dim lights, no loud music) worked great. I used to write by hand.

Walks helped too, but the most important thing overcoming writing blocks was discipline. Consistently writing and getting over procrastination was huge, both in terms of the quality as well as volume of work produced.

Finally, exploring different subcultures and pushing the envelop through wildly varying experiences gave my writing much more depth and helped craft more believable prose. The more shit you've lived through, the more stuff you have to draw from..just as it is easy to differentiate the keyboard jockey from the real player due to the subtle details the player draws from real world experience...

Thanks BB, you just inspired me to start writing again

Edit - sorry for the derail