Sunday, September 21, 2008
Sunday, 21 September 2008
At last I finished the play today.
The last time I wrote a play so entirely on instinct it was Losing Venice. In those days, instinct was all I had. I didn’t know any other way to write a play.
So I wrote it all down quite innocently and unquestioningly.
These days, I know worse. Or perhaps better. Better in the sense that I have all kinds of technical understanding of what makes scenes work, and how they fit together to make a whole play work.
Worse in the sense that this continually got in my way. Because I kept trying to censor this play, Every One, so that it would be more like plays that I knew would work.
But it simply kept insisting on taking its own path. On taking the form it had to take.
And in the end I simply had to learn to stop worrying about whether it would work or not. And accept that it had to take the form it took, and there was nothing I could do about it.
Something easier to say than do.
And now its over I just feel an immense sense of joy and relief.
At last I finished the play today.
The last time I wrote a play so entirely on instinct it was Losing Venice. In those days, instinct was all I had. I didn’t know any other way to write a play.
So I wrote it all down quite innocently and unquestioningly.
These days, I know worse. Or perhaps better. Better in the sense that I have all kinds of technical understanding of what makes scenes work, and how they fit together to make a whole play work.
Worse in the sense that this continually got in my way. Because I kept trying to censor this play, Every One, so that it would be more like plays that I knew would work.
But it simply kept insisting on taking its own path. On taking the form it had to take.
And in the end I simply had to learn to stop worrying about whether it would work or not. And accept that it had to take the form it took, and there was nothing I could do about it.
Something easier to say than do.
And now its over I just feel an immense sense of joy and relief.
Labels: "Every One" is finished
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