Inspiration---Every writer needs it and finds in many different places. There have been quite a few writers who inspired me through the years, but I’ll touch on just five of them.
Whenever I think about overcoming adversity I remember the late Irish writer Christy Brown. I read Brown’s autobiographical novel, Down All the Days, back when I was about to enter the army. At the time I was feeling that life had dealt me a bad hand when I came across Brown’s book. Reading the man’s amazing prose, along with hearing his incredible real life story, made me realize that my own problems were pretty insignificant compared to what this man had gone through and overcome. Imagine being dirt poor, the tenth of twenty children of an alcoholic brute . . . Imagine not being able to speak and having to teach yourself to read and write . . . Imagine having a razor-sharp intellect and being trapped in a body that you couldn’t control . . . And then imagine overcoming such adversity, and fulfilling your dream to become an acclaimed writer and artist. Any excuses I ever used not to write or succeed were shallow by comparison.
Brown, who was severely afflicted with cerebral palsy at birth, grew up in poverty and was basically self-taught. He acquired his amazing vocabulary by paging through the dictionary and reading each page. And he did this by using the one limb of his body over which he had a modicum of control: his left foot. Brown was also an accomplished artist (again holding the brush between his toes) and a poet. His autobiography, My Left Foot, which Brown expanded into Down All the Days, was subsequently made into the academy award winning motion picture starring Daniel Day Lewis. Christy Brown was able to overcome so much that his life should stand as an example for everyone.
His story did not have a Hollywood ending in real life, however. There were allegations that Brown was neglected by his caretaker wife, and he died suffocating on his own food in 1981. He was only 49 years old, but in his too brief life he the temerity to realize his dreams.
Realizing your dreams is a wonderful thing. Gwendolyn Brooks grew up on the South Side of Chicago and experienced the racial prejudice and segregation of the mid-Twentieth Century. She was born in 1917 and attended four different high schools in Chi-town, ranging from the prestigious, mostly white Hyde Park High, to all-black Wendell Phillips High School. She found her inspiration when, as a burgeoning poet, she had her first poem published at age thirteen. This led to a meeting with Harlem Renaissance poets Langston Hughes and James Wendon Johnson. She struggled in obscurity for years, doing typing jobs to support herself. Eventually her work was recognized and in 1962 President John F. Kennedy invited her to read at a Library of Congress poetry festival. She went on to teach creative writing at various colleges including my alma mater, Columbia College Chicago.
I remember reading some of Brooks’ poetry for the first time in her book, Blacks. The stark imagery, told with a hard-edged realism, was nothing short of riveting. That she could capture the voice of her roots, the struggle of her people, with such a succinct elegance filled me with wonder. She was named the Poet Laureate of Illinois in 1968 and the Poet Laureate of the Library of Congress in 1985. After so many years of struggling, her work was finally recognized on a national level. I never got to hear Ms. Brooks speak. She died in 2000 at age 83 and is buried in Lincoln Cemetery which is about a mile from my house. My daily run usually takes me by this cemetery and I never fail to remember “Lady Gwendolyn” as I pass it. To me, she exemplifies perseverance.
I often think of another poet who found his voice in prose as well as verse whenever I struggle trying to write an opening paragraph. I read James Dickey’s Deliverance when it first came out and have yet to find a better opening line in any novel:
It unrolled slowly, forced to show its colors, curling and snapping back whenever one of us turned loose.
This sentence describes a paper map of the remote mountain area where three Atlanta businessmen are planning a canoe trip that ends up being a descent into a remote, primitive hell. It wasn’t until I’d finished the book that I went back and re-read that first line that I realized Dickey had summed up the entire novel in that one sentence The unruly map acts as a metaphor for the savagery the unsuspecting businessmen will experience on their forthcoming trip. The paper map is almost like a live beast as it curls back toward them, like a giant claw. He brought his poet’s vision to his prose.
Dickey served as a combat pilot in both World War II and Korea. He worked in advertising in Atlanta for a time, and became a nationally recognized poet. He worked on Deliverance, his first novel, for ten years. When it was published in 1971 it became an immediate bestseller and was made into an equally enthralling motion picture. Dickey had a small role as a rural sheriff in the movie. Unfortunately, he wrote only two more novels before his death in 1997. His struggle with alcohol and other health problems probably limited his creative output, but to me his incredible use of metaphor and lyrical prose serve as a reminder that choosing one’s words carefully, for the maximum effect, is the goal of every writer.
Another writer who inspired me was Louie L’Amour. He was the greatest western writer who ever lived, and an underrated stylist as well. At the time of his death in 1988 he had written 105 books, most of which were still in print. Eighty-nine of these books were novels, fourteen were short story collections, and two were non-fiction books. L’Amour lived a full and adventurous life in his youth and was able to bring those experiences to his writing. L’Amour had been a boxer and he brought the same work ethic and skill to his writing that he had in the ring. He always turned out a solid, workmanlike performance and knew the importance of doing his research.
Although his writing was criticized in academic circles, I found his style enthralling. His popularity and success was the best answer to these patronizing academics who took cheap potshots at him from their ivory tower vantage points. What’s that old quote? Those who can’t teach . . . While I don’t totally agree with that one, I do think that professors show an unrealistic and unfair bias toward popular writers like L’Amour, who have the guts and determination to make it in the real world. L’Amour never lost sight of who he was. Once asked how he’d been able to write so much, his reply was typical of his humble personality: I look at my volume of work and wonder how I’ve produced so little. To me, there is no other writer who exemplifies a solid work ethic more than Louis L’Amour. If you want to be a writer, put your butt in the chair and write.
Producing work and doing it with style and grace is the ultimate goal of every writer. Honing your craft until you have the ability to distill the essence of what you want to say in a succinct, yet engaging fashion is something we all strive to master. Perhaps no one exemplified this better in recent times than Robert B. Parker. Like L’Amour, Parker was able to produce a large quantity of highly successful work and always did it with panache and style. He is credited with revitalizing the waning private eye genre in the 1970s, and was extremely adept at using crisp dialogue and a minimalistic style to advance his story lines. At the end of his career was producing four books a year. His Spenser character was also the basis for a successful television series. We never found out Spenser’s first name through forty books, the last of which, Sixkill, has yet to be released. Being able to keep a series going for forty books is a tremendous feat, and Parker had four different series going as well as an occasional stand-alone novel. He rose to the top of his profession through dedication and hard work.
I had the pleasure of meeting Parker several times when he came to Chicago on book tours. He was a very down to earth nice guy and listening to him was fascinating. His success never went to his head. To me he exemplified the ultimate in mastery of one’s craft. Parker did what a writer should do, and did it with the aplomb of a true professional. He died in January of this year at his keyboard, doing what he loved best---Writing.
Of course, there are many more sources of inspiration for me, but I’ve centered on these five because each exemplified a crucial element of being, for lack of a better term, a wordsmith. Each of them exhibited the temerity, perseverance, succinctness, humility, and the drive to hone one’s craft in a relentless pursuit of perfection.
