Originality is a form of stupidity.
It can be a perverse stupidity — for example, not taking the obvious route, because it’s obvious.
I think this is where most writers start, if they are concerned with doing something no-one else has done quite that way before.
Hence the continuing attraction for many young writers of Surrealism and Dada and Bob Dylan’s lyrics.
And it can be an affected stupidity — writing down to your audience, because you think they won’t get it if you’re paradoxical.
But true originality comes from encountering an original obstacle.
(This is not an original statement, though I can’t remember where I first heard it.)
You are walking through the world, minding your own, when you find something blocking you.
You can’t go easily on.
It’s odd, though. Because no-one else has found this thing a bittersweet problem before, not in quite the way you do.
To them, it’s been a gate rather than a fence, a pet rather than a predator, a hole to walk round rather than a hell to go through.
Raymond Carver, in Fires: Essays, Poems, Stories, said —
At the risk of appearing foolish, a writer sometimes needs to be able to just stand and gape at this or that thing — a sunset or an old shoe — in absolute and simple amazement.
Amazement, and possibly dismay.
What is this thing?
That is a very stupid question to ask.
Everyone knows.
It’s a sunset. It’s an old shoe.
But the writer insists —
Why is this thing as this thing is?
Then they think —
Why are things the way things are?
(Clearly, for writer you can also insert artist or inventor or scientist or worker.)
In order for you to encounter an original obstacle, you probably don’t have to travel very far.
You’re likely to meet one in the first sentence you put down.
The difficulty is the ease with which you can then pass on.
It’s not worth losing time over this.
No-one else seems to find this a problem.
But it’s in Carver’s standing and gaping at this thing or that, and then standing longer, and gaping more, that’s where originality originates.
You feel so stupid, being arrested by such obviousness.
But stick with the stupid.
I like what you said here. It makes sense. A valuable piece of advice. And it's true that originality can be found in an unusual observation of detail in a seemingly irrelevant object.
Readers have commented my work is unlike anything else. This sounds alright, but it can be a problem for getting published as 'comps' are hard to come by and then, you're accused of not being 'well-read' which is untrue in my case. Or, you're compared to a writer nothing like you because of a common theme or atmosphere.
I reckon the reason is, I'm entirely uneducated. Left school with no qualifications, due to dyslexia and schizophrenia. I never read a 'how to write' book, or did a creative writing course, or workshop. Never had a mentor either. Had some advice and picked bits up along the way, but mostly learnt by reading fiction I like and writing.
But also, because my work is often the POV of a schizophrenic perspective. A very 'altered state' of being. Written as delusion, hallucination, paranoia, etc. being the true perception, as that is how it's experienced. All the delirium, disoriented confusion, fear, and anxiety is written to be felt by the reader. An intentionally uncomfortable read.
But, as well as being uneducated, I'm working class and my experiences are of unemployment, factories, warehouses, building sites, violence, and crime. Most writers seem to have been to university and had education, or even possibly, a career. And rarely do I see a writer who's clearly experienced much violence. At least, not in England. You can see this when writers claim 'words are violence' or some such idea. They're not. If you had the shit beaten out of you all the time for nothing by your parents as a child, beaten to concussion several times by your father in your teens, grew up among villains and thugs, everyone you knew got stabbed and had many fights, some you won, some you lost, attacked by police and gangsters, having been battered close to death along the way, you'd know exactly what violence is, and it ain't words. It's a machete, a knife, a cosh, a fist, a boot in the face.
Anyway, sorry, I got distracted there. I get carried away, and I went off subject. But my point is, sometimes, originality can come from experience. If you are a schizophrenic, working class, drug addict of a criminal who lived beyond the fringes of 'normal' society, your outlook is very likely quite different to most writers.
except kafka