Your Muse, and You

You find yourself at the keyboard, ready to give to the world. The muse inside yourself cackles as it takes over and sets the scene. Your fingers tap the board like a guitarist doing a riff on autopilot. Your muse doesn’t care about you or the others as it works its magic. It cares about the story. It cares about the characters in it, and how they react in your mind’s eye. The keyboard sings a song, you melodiously plod along. You sip your coffee. Perhaps it’s tea? You continue, and long after your hot cup turns cold, so does your muse. It loses inspiration, and vanishes away for you to edit and clean its sloppy creation. Do what you will with that unfiltered story. However, I have a few things to say for the writer that questions their muse and the characters they create.

In Episode 137 of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine “Far Beyond the Stars”, a preacher was telling aspiring black writer Benny Russell, a dream version of Captain Sisko, to: “Write the words.” During the entirety of the episode, Sisko’s dream character was perplexed about the preacher’s meaning, but took his preaching to mean it was about the story he was writing. Through hardship, Russell kept asking the preacher why, and he only kept telling him: “Write those words,” not just for himself, but in the name of the prophets! Like the muse screaming inside your head to get its idea on paper, damn it!

So Russell digs deep, and writes an epic story about the leader of Deep Space Nine, Captain Benjamin Sisko, and his adventures. Familiar? While receiving high praise from his writing peers, Russell’s editor in chief thought Russell’s black character was too unbelievable for readers to accept. He offered Russell to change his character to a white man, but there was no such thing. It was Russell’s character, and his alone! Towards the end of the episode, Russell broke down sobbing after refuting that the world could not tear away ideas that were his.

In my opinion, Russell was talking about his creativity. His muse. His story. Why take away something so plainly created despite racial intolerance? The episode brings home the point that whatever your muse creates should be set in stone. It’s not something that should be changed easily. If you wrote the story, it’s offensive to the author to demand a change of character to satisfy the reader. It would certainly offend me. I would say it was my muse that created the story, and that’s what it came up with. There is no compromise there.

Some may rebut: “But the writer is black, creating a black character. That should be fine. We’re talking about a white writer creating a black character!” Phooey. That’s like saying Stephen King can’t write The Green Mile. That’s like telling Kathryn Stockett she should never have written The Help because she could never understand the suppressed black minority of the 1960’s era. That’s bullcrap. Can people not empathize with people? Isn’t sharing the plight of others not a caring deed? Did you not retell the terrible story that befell your friend to others? People talk. It’s what we do best. The fact that authors write down what they hear and see doesn’t make their storytelling wrong. Stockett has become a best selling author because of her courage to tell an uncomfortable yet riveting story, not out of ignorance for African American hardship. Steven King put John Coffey on death row, and I’m sure some people find King’s story to be rather racist because of it. Those that do must have limited imaginations, as they only pay attention to the facts, and not the story. I’m sure Mr. King would be happy to report that he doesn’t care about the feelings he hurt when writing about Coffey. Though, I certainly want to curse his muse for putting such a lovable character there.

So when does it become too much? If Steven King could write about a black man on death row, why can’t I? And there’s truth to this. I think that for a majority of unpaid and free style writers, nothing is too much! Be racist and spiteful to your heart’s content! Like I said, stereotypes should mean nothing to your muse. But be warned. Racism and bigotry without context will make inconsistent money, and few friends.

What if you were a serious writer then? Well, there’s King, and Stockett. These two writers have the understanding that it takes care to make these characters realistic despite the authors deriving them from out of context. (Out of skin?) Though, I’d argue that King didn’t need stereotypes when the reality of Southern racism explains Coffey’s predicament perfectly. Stockett’s book has the exact same underlying theme, except it dives into the workplace instead of a penitentiary. Their stories work for publishers because that context helps make Coffey, Aibileen, and Yule May real to readers. Even if the truth hurts. We all know what it means to not be accepted, and it’s not all black and white. Realism matters to readers because if they can imagine it, then it’s real enough to them. They’ll go with you and the characters your muse creates.

What about profanity? Should I be afraid of cuss words? Should you? Do certain words belong to certain people? No. All words belong in the dictionary, and it’s all free to use. You don’t have to be black to say the “N” word in your story, but I do think you have to respect the context of the word, and take care for how realistic it is in the setting. You should certainly be ready to take responsibility for it.

Ultimately, I think you have to respect the work it takes to make the characters real. A better writer should focus on making great characters, not trying to find ways to make the writing harder for the writer. I would recommend you write the words, but your muse is already telling you that, isn’t it? Well, you better do it soon. It’s preaching, and I can hear it.

Write the words!