Writing's Mad Scientist

Here's another playful writing activity that is bound to get the creative sparks sparking, the creative flow flowing, and the creative juices . . . um, juicing? Anyway, this is one step up from the Dictionary Game. Instead of one random word, you generate two. I call it . . .

Adventures of a Wordly Mad Scientist

You throw two strange compounds together into a test tube. You give it a shake. You heat it up over a flame. Then . . . who knows what amazing chemical reaction you'll get? The test tube may even explode!

I found a great site which generates random pairs of words:

http://creativityforyou.com/combomaker.html

When two words, a noun and an adjective, are randomly thrown together, you get some interesting combinations that really get your creativity sparking, flowing and juicing (?) I've tried a few out. Sometimes it takes a number of tries with the generator before you see one that has that special intriguing quality about it. So far, my favourite one is . . .

Quiet Chaos

I'll put this combination in my little mind and let the creative dough rise. I'm not sure what I'm going to write, but I know this combination has some possibilities. I'll get back to you on this one.

Jumper Cables for the Imagination

What’s the greatest fear of every writer? Illiterate zombies taking over the world? Loss of use of the left pinkie finger, thus necessitating the use of words that exclude the letters ‘q,’ ‘a,’ and ‘z’? Probably not.

I’m talking about Writer’s Block– the sudden inability to put words to paper. More accurately, the inability to create ideas which spawn words. I have a particular fascination with this phenomenon. Don’t ask me why.

Over the years, I have taken on this dreaded condition, developing a variety of methods for its remedy. They don’t always work, and some work better than others.

The first one I’d like to mention is what I call . . .

“The Dictionary Game”

If you’re stuck, and can’t think of the next sentence to write, grab a dictionary– a dictionary of slang is my favourite. Close your eyes, open to a random page, and jab your finger on a random spot on the page. Open your eyes and read the word. Challenge yourself to include that word in your next sentence.

It sounds counter-intuitive. Here you are, forcing yourself to fit a word into a sentence when you can’t even think of a sentence in the first place. The strange thing is, it often works. For some reason, when your mind is backed into a corner by being forced to use a particular word, this is a call to arms for the imagination. The random word is like a jolt that gets the mind rolling again.

Give it a try. Think of it as a game. If it doesn’t work, you haven’t lost anything. Let me know how it goes.