It’s midnight on Saturday. I am ecstatic, my cheeks red with exhaustion and exhilaration at the same time. No, I am not clubbing or at a party with friends. Here I am, sitting alone at the wooden dining room table, my heart pumping in my chest. I’ve decided that being a writer is isolating. It’s just you and the keyboard of your computer. Except perhaps for the friends I’ve discovered in the magical worlds I create through the use of words. Mōrena Pēpi Kiore (cute baby mouse). Kia ora Keatangata (cute baby Kea). As you can see, I like cute native animals in my storylines.
‘I’ve been reading books written by writers on their creative process.’
I’ve spent five months and too many days to count, writing this novel. Waking up early every morning, my laptop open and the unnatural light of the screen searing my sleepy eyes. I’m lucky I have the flexibility of being a university student as this week I’ve spent two entire days writing. My weight has increased as the amount of exercise I do has decreased to zilch, zero, nothing. If I could show it to you on a line graph (I can’t; I’m a writer), you would see the line representing my level of physical exercise plummet dramatically. My natural tan has become steadily more vampire-like. Sometimes when I arrive at university for ‘mahi’, I go straight to the postgraduate student cafe and order a herbal tea. There I sit with my laptop and write for a couple of hours before I get into my master’s thesis (also an imminently approaching deadline). Shoot me now.
I’ve been reading books written by writers on their creative process, including Terry Brooks’s Sometimes the Magic Works and Elizabeth Gilbert’s Big Magic. From Talisman Terry, I’ve learnt that taking the time to draft an outline for your novel is a good idea. I realise I might have been over-estimating my writing abilities by creating my plot on the run. As Terry says, ‘now on top of that you want to mess around with trying to figure out your plot? Who do you think you are – Houdini?’ Ouch, that one hurt, Terry. So, I write a quick outline for this novel and then find my writing output increases tenfold because when I sit down to write, I now know where I am going and how far I have to go.
‘… if inspiration is allowed to unexpectedly enter you it is also allowed to unexpectedly exit you’
From Eat, Pray, Love Elizabeth, I’ve learnt that sometimes ideas magically ascend to those of us living a creative life and therefore must be grasped fully with two consistent hands. Otherwise, it may flutter over to someone else who cares for it more deeply, ‘because this is the other side of the contract with creativity: if inspiration is allowed to unexpectedly enter you it is also allowed to unexpectedly exit you’. I am thankful I cared deeply enough about this story so it didn’t leave me for someone else. Two-timing manuscript.
I binge-watch two documentaries on the creative process of Hayao Miyazaki, the celebrated Japanese film director and co-owner of the fantastical Studio Ghibli. I learn about work ethic from koro Hayao of Spirited Away and Princess Mononoke fame, who even at the age of seventy-two was still working on his movie The Wind Rises from
11 a.m. to 9 p.m. Monday to Saturday. As a writer, those long and consistent hours would seriously churn out some big books and fast.
I am astonished to find out that koro Hayao draws the entire storyboard of his movie by hand. Every single painstaking second of his movie drawn by hand. Sheesh, writing is an easy gig compared to old-school animating. He makes up the storyline as he goes. Often the entire studio doesn’t know the outcome until the completion of the entire storyboard. What I find most impressive about this is the faith that the million dollar financiers of his movies must have in his abilities. I imagine a conversation between koro Hayao and his investors.
‘Will you spend millions financing my movie?’
‘Sure what is the storyline? Who are the characters?’
‘I don’t know; I make it up as I go.’
‘Please, take my money.’
I read online articles on the creators of manga that inspire me, like Rumiko Takahashi and her Japanese mythological tale Inuyasha. All this so that my mind and body can be enthused with the kind of magical creative energy that will help me to complete this novel, or so I fervently hope.
So here we are. The first book I have ever attempted to write and the first book I have ever completed, all in one fell swoop. All 74,250 words, 343 pages and 35 chapters of it. I can see my characters Hine and Pakū in my head, or maybe they are in my heart. I wonder about the second book of the series that I hope to be able to write and how it might tie into the first. My eyes tear up as I reread the last chapter. I know this book is good. The ending worked out well; the characters grow and develop as they should in a coming-of-age YA novel.
‘I realise that I’ve become someone who contributes creatively to literature rather than just another reader who takes without giving back.’
It feels almost sad like the magical, hair-raising, exhilarating, awe-inspiring journey is over. But then I’m also proud that I wrote my own magical story rather than just reading someone else’s. I realise that I’ve become someone who contributes creatively to literature rather than just another reader who takes without giving back. Like Terry, Elizabeth, koro Hayao and Rumiko. But perhaps what I am most excited about is the story that I’ve written for me.
It is true; this story is the one I wish I could have read when I was a child. All aspects of it – the Māori goddesses, the wars, the animals, the battles, the beautiful and glorious nature – all of it is exactly what I like in a novel. It’s a compilation, an accumulation of the favoured preferences of the lifetime (so far) lived by one precocious adult. It’s magical; it’s special; it’s loving. I realise what this feeling is. It’s pride. Like the pride one feels when their child learns a new skill. This book is my baby. And my baby has grown into a teenager. She’s still got a way to go – a bit of editing, a lot of rewriting, moving things from here to there – but she’s on track.
I hope my bubble of happiness won’t be burst when I receive feedback on the completed transcript from my mentor. But for now, I feel proud. I thank my mentors Terry, Elizabeth, koro Hayao, Rumiko and, of course, my Te Papa Tupu mentor, Simon. I pat myself on the back (figuratively) and go to bed, my mind still racing from the adventure I created solely from the colourful recesses of my mind. Which in itself is amazing.
Creating is a wonderful thing.
