Req for recs

[kaberett]

Apparently this week I am pondering the construction of the idea of "muse" instead of working on my transfer report.

In particular I am wondering about how other people have conceptualised their relationships with real flesh-and-blood human beings they consider muses; presence/absence, the form of inspiration, and so on, and so forth. I think there is an essay trying to happen, but in order to tease out the details I rather suspect I need to expose myself to a wider range of viewpoints.

Suggestions and discussion in comments very much appreciated.

eta "museum" is "a seat or shrine of the Muses"!!!!

Comments

[kate]

Hi - here from my network page.

This reminds me of Stephen King's description of his muse (who is not a live human being) as the guy in the basement with the fairydust (or something close to that - it's from On Writing).

So I have to ask whether you mean someone who inspires you to write/produce art of any sort (i.e. a friend who gives prompts that spark your interest) or someone who inspires you to write/produce art about them (i.e. Chris Evans' physique).

If you mean the first, then I have lots of muses, but I usually have one person at a time in a fandom whose brain just works like mine and sparks lots of writing ideas. I love those fandom friends, they're the best.

The other... I don't have that much. I like characters individually, but mostly it's their relationships with other characters that captures me, so I don't really dwell on individuals so much as how they think about other people. I guess that means I have a gang of muses, usually? But when I'm in a fandom, I flip from character to character, I don't tend to stick with one religiously (though I usually have a few favorites I prefer to write). I know that other people use pics of their favorite characters to get in the mood, or music, sometimes, but that's not my way.

Hope you get lots of answers to this - it's a fascinating subject!

[kaberett]

The handwave I can give without getting too much into the stuff that feels awkward/difficult to talk about in public until I've sorted it out some more goes: there is a particular flesh-and-blood person who just by existing in my life encourages me to look at the world differently/do serious self-reflection/think hard about how I want to communicate, and what I want to communicate about. And so I have recently ended up writing quite a lot of poem "about" them, except it's... in many cases only tangentially about them, or about the idea of them, more than it about them-as-person; and it's work that I don't expect them to ever particularly like or appreciate (one of the many soubriquets I apply to this particular person is My Unpoetical Lover). It's not that we talk about my poetry or art, particularly, but we do have conversations about communication and how I view the world, which tends to Spark Stuff; but most of what I've written about them since mid-January has been completely in the absence of any communication with them.

... erm, that got quite tangled; hopefully it is at this point clear why I am after having a discussion, heh!

Thank you so much for contributing! As and when I've actually sorted my thoughts out and written them up coherently I'll try to remember to chuck a link your way :-)

[kate]

Ah, yes, I totally get what you're talking about. I don't have one of those, never have; I'm not sure I would like one, tbh, I have enough of a hard time dealing with creative endeavors without having them hang on a person. Maybe it's just not in my nature to have a muse of that sort? Hm. That's an excellent question.

There are a lot of people that help with the creative process, though - like I said above, my fandom friends to spark interest, and also my wife, who can listen to me talk about something I'm working on and take it and twist it around until she fixes whatever block I'm having (or helps me fix it myself).

I'm really interested to read your thoughts - I'm going to subscribe just to be sure I don't miss it, if you don't mind.

ETA: Also, I'm not much of a poetry person (lack of education and a bit of pedestrianism), but yours are quite lovely - thank you for the link!

[kaberett]

I've never had one before and I'm kind of baffled that it's happening now, to be honest; I'm much more used to having people I can bounce ideas backwards and forwards with ("playing catch with art", as elisem says), to talk to about what I'm working on and build from there. This feels very different and very weird, which is some of why I want to work it out -- it's... kind of like having an absent-other (see conversation with alexseanchai elsethread) as a focus for solitary work. It's odd.

Subscription very much welcome; delighted to make your acquaintance, and thank you for the kind words about the poetry :-)

[kate]

You're welcome - and I am now even MORE interested to read, because that's how I am - playing catch with art is a brilliant way of capturing it - and I am very interested to read about that other sort of muse.

Also - the whole point of this post! Recs of people who have muses like this, I really only know musicians, and the ones I'd suggest are Brahms and the Schumanns (Clara, but also Robert, I think) and possibly Liszt and Chopin (they were... frenemies?). There are a lot of classical musicians (composers, I mean here) that had muses.

Also, I'm not sure, because (obviously!) this is not my forte, but I believe Pablo Neruda had a muse like this, the person he wrote the 100 love sonnets about? They're some of the poetry that I do like, so I know just the tiniest bit about them.

[kaberett]

Hmm, maybe I should pull the Neruda back off the shelf and reread; I had the impression that they were more a gift than my writing is, but definitely something to ponder!

Thank you for the recs. :-)