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In this online exclusive we ask authors to share books, art, music, writing prompts, films—anything and everything—that has inspired them in their writing. We see this as a place for writers to turn to for ideas that will help feed their creative process.
“I draw a lot of inspiration from visual art. One of the early and ongoing inspirations for me is a painter (and happily, a friend) named Michael Brophy whose ironic yet romantic images of western clear-cuts, slash piles, stumps, and domesticated forest scapes opened a whole new way of seeing my own backyard (the Northwest).
“The majority of us start off asking our peers and our instructors, How can I improve my prose/poetry? How can I become ‘publishable’? These are necessary and essential questions. Equally essential, yet often neglected, is the question, How can I assist other writers?
“My yoga and meditation practices have become such an integral part of my writing life that I can’t imagine what it would be like to sit down to write without knowing that, at some point in the day, I will be able to unroll my mat and quiet my mind.
“For almost three years now I’ve been obsessed with the work of South African photographer Roger Ballen. His photos act as a propeller for me in my writing. There is a spookiness to his work that invigorates me.
“From the moment a writer is attached to a story, said Saul Bellow, he or she suddenly has ‘feelers all over the place.’ So once I’m attached, I draw inspiration from what I think the character in question would read or consume.
“Because I am an American and often worry about many things, I seek out consolation before beginning to write, and little in this world consoles me more than the male falsetto: Skip James, Jónsi Birgisson, Pepe Núñez, Roscoe Holcomb, Antony Hegarty and company.
“Pandit Pran Nath was a conduit for an understanding of Indian classical singing, and a major influence on American minimalism, whose disciples included Lamonte Young and Terry Riley.
“When I’m in the thick of a project, the most important sources of inspiration are those that help me open the gates of reverie, that make me descend into that nonverbal realm from which potent fiction paradoxically springs.
“Often I thumb through animal books—the National Audubon Society’s field guides to birds and fish almost always shake something loose. For instance my poem ‘Parts of a Feather’ in Sagittarius Agitprop (Black Lawrence Press, 2009) was inspired by, and depends heavily on, such bird facts.
“I don’t intentionally scrapbook for inspiration, but that always ends up happening. I will see a graphic or image, or hear a song on the radio, and start to collect them for characters whose perspectives I am about to inhabit.
