putting words on paper

As many bloggers think of themselves as writers I though you might enjoy reading about the habits of established authors…

Bennett Cerf got his best ideas while sitting on the toilet. Hemingway had to sharpen a score of pencils before he stood up to write. Lewis Carroll and Virginia Woolf also worked standing up.

image found here

Poe often perched his Siamese cat on his shoulder before writing a poem. Kipling couldn’t begin unless he had dark ink to work with. “Had I been in my father’s house I would have kept an ink-boy to grind me Indian ink”.

Kipling as a child found here

Hervey Allen said he only had to lie down and the voices of his ancestors dictated to him. Truman Capote called himself a ‘truly horizontal’ writer who could not think or write unless lying down. He also had to have yellow paper but no yellow roses were allowed in the room.

Capote by Warhol found here

Alexandre Dumas wrote his non-fiction on rose-coloured paper, his novels on blue paper and his poetry on yellow paper. Dumas was an insomniac whose doctor ordered him to eat an apple a day at 7:00 am under the Arc de Triomphe in the hope that it would help him form regular rising and sleeping patterns.

Arc de Triomphe 1944 found here

Disraeli dressed in evening clothes while writing his novels. Henrik Ibsen had one of the strangest working habits of all. He was inspired by a picture of August Strindberg that hung over his desk. Said Ibsen “He is my mortal enemy and shall hang there and watch while I write“.

Ibsen found here

Benjamin Franklin wrote in the bathtub. Victor Hugo probably went to the most extreme lengths to get down to work: he gave all his clothes to his servant with orders that they be returned only after he had completed several hours of writing.

Victor Hugo found here

Balzac believed that sex and writing were incompatible and that his writing prowess depended on how much sperm he retained in his body. He once had an uncontrollable nocturnal emission and claimed that it cost him a masterpiece the following day.

Balzac before and after found here

I can’t begin writing a new post until I have visited my “daily reads” and all the blogs of those who have left comments on mine. I have to have silence too, can’t concentrate with music playing. Generally, I do the writing part first, then have dinner and a glass of wine before coming back to do the illustrations. What’s your writing habit?