Writers' Block

Prisons For The Literate

by Alexander Lachlan McLintock (alexmc@biccdc.co.uk)
written 05 May 1994

This article is classified "Fictional"


It is a well known fact that writers write some of their best works when
depressed, moody, and poor.  The reasons for this are essentially that if
someone is happy and basically well off then they really don't have much to
write about.  Most writing about nice things is rather banal.  Examples of
"nice-writing" could be Shakespeare's sonnets.  Lots of roses and summer's
days for example.  Most modern reviewers criticize Shakespeare's poetry for
not having a part for the "Arnold Schwarzenegger character."

This happy-factor was the basis the of the holiday/prison camp called
"Writers' Block."  In Writers' Block meals were bread and water, cable TV
was rationed to one hour a day, people were locked up in rooms with nothing
but paper and pencils (the pencils had rubber leads so writers couldn't
hurt themselves), and visitors had to see the inmates through bullet proof
glass.

The fees for this place were very high, as you would expect for the best of
health farms, but it produced some of the best novels of the Pinta Beer Era.

See also:
  • McLintock, Alexander Lachlan
  • Prolific Writing
  • Essay Questions
  • Inspiration, Lack Of
  • Typographical Errors
  • Throwing Book

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