Honestly, sometimes I feel like a broken record when I write about my experiences working on the White Rose.
I’ve repeated various parts of my story so many times, whether in writing, in conversations, or in my head, that it feels kind of embarrassing.
Like when someone who is about to tell a story says, “stop me if I’ve told you this before” - but you don’t stop them because that seems rude, even though you’ve definitely heard the story before…I feel like both of those people in the interaction.
I experience a mix of wanting to give proper context every time in case I encounter someone who happens to not have my life story memorized, but also, some part of me most benefit from the constant retelling in order to process and figure things out.
Which is why I’m going to lean into that, and allow myself to retrace my steps in my White Rose and other journeys.
I’m still struggling to “figure out” my script, the angle, the direction and what I’m trying to say as a writer of this show. So I’ll keep writing and sharing, even at the risk of being repetitive.
As I consider this, I take inspiration from this passage from Doctor Zhivago:
Outside, the frosty winter night was pale blue. To see it better, Yurii Andreievich stepped into the next room, cold and dark, and looked out of the window. The light of the full moon on the snow-covered clearing was as viscid as white of egg or thick white paint. The splendor of the frosty night was inexpressible. His heart was at peace. He went back into the warm, well-lit room and began to write.
Careful to convey the living movement of his hand in his flowing writing, so that even outwardly it should not lose individuality and grow numb and soulless, he set down, gradually improving them and moving further and further away from the original as he made copy after copy, the poems that he remembered best and that had taken the most definite shape in his mind...
From these old, completed poems, he went on to others that he had begun and left unfinished, getting into their spirit and sketching the sequels, though without the slightest hope of finishing them now. Finally getting into his stride and carried away, he started on a new poem.
After two or three stanzas and several images by which he himself was struck, his work took possession of him and he felt the approach of what is called inspiration. At such moments the relation of the forces that determine artistic creation is, as it were, reversed. The dominant thing is not longer the state of mind the artist seeks to express but the language in which he wants to express it.
Language, the home and receptacle of beauty and meaning, itself begins to think and speak for man and turns wholly into music, not in terms of sonority, but in terms of the impetuousness and power of its inward flow. Then, like the current of a mighty river polishing stones and turning wheels by its very movement, the flow of speech creates in passing, by virtue of its own laws, meter and rhythm and countless other relationships, which are even more important, but which are as yet unexplored, insufficiently recognized, and unnamed.
At such moments Yurii Andreievich felt that the main part of the work was being done not by him but by a superior power which was above him and directed him, namely the movement of universal thought and poetry in its present historical stage and the one to come. And he felt himself to be only the occasion, the fulcrum, needed to make this movement possible.
On another note, writing these posts twice a week has definitely stretched my ability to be consistent and disciplined, but I’ve managed to stay mostly on schedule. And it’s so nice and motivating when I get comments and emails back, even if I’m slow to respond!
I received this wonderful bit of perspective from Alexandra Gardner, a fantastic composer, teacher, mentor and all around wonderful person in response to my post about sources of inspiration (sharing with her permission):
Girl! This is (probably) not it for your inspiration buckets. You are young! Sure, there's a ton there to work with, but I'm willing to bet that as the years go by, you will find other things that spark your interest from an artistic perspective. Maybe you can't imagine what they will be, and that's a-okay. You'll know when you know.
Consider that all the people and things that are so important to you are part of your creative ancestry. The principal inspirations that have led you to develop into the artist you are, with your artistic values, characteristics, and voice. They have laid the foundation for you to keep growing as an artist. Sure, milk them for ideas as long as you can, but at some point, it stops being inspiration and is simply comfortable. I realize it is not like this for everyone, but imho the whole POINT of making art is to get out of one's comfort zone. And that extends to one's source material.
A person's creative ancestry can serve as an inspirational home base that can lead to...anything at all! I encourage you to be open to random crazy ideas the next time you're reading Daniel Deronda, for example. There are all kinds of things we think we don't have a knack for that pop up and make us go, "but WHAT IF....???" Don't let your current self shut down something that your future self wants to do, just because it doesn't seem to fit or you think you wouldn't be good at it.
I'm just saying... my 38-yo self had NO IDEA what creative stuff was coming. She wouldn't believe me if I traveled back in time to tell her!
ANYHOO [*steps off soapbox*] I can't wait for what else you make, whatever the inspo!
I’m grateful to be on the creative journey alongside so many people whom I admire, and whom I am fortunate to call friends, mentors, and current or former clients.
For what it’s worth, my WR journey started when I was two years older than you are now. 💕🌸