THE ROOT OF DESIRE

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What’s on today: My first attempt at a Writers’ Island prompt post. Hope you like it … PLUS … Pickpocketing gangs back on the streets of London. The strange story of two Goths and a Chippie.
YOU KNOW IT’S THE WRITE WAY

THE ROOT OF DESIRE

We can do it with passion. It can take over our entire mind, dictate our every action. Whether the subject is the person you love or a hamburger, it is immaterial. When you want something so much, you are the plaything of your desires.
The ‘hamburger’ is more important to the subject than my flippancy seems to suggest. It was the psychologist Abraham Maslow who devised the idea of the ‘hierarchy of wants’. It was a simple system to explain what drives us.

Most people only achieve the first four basic wants.

These are to eat, to have shelter, to procreate and have family, and to satisfy your self-esteem. The average life, and social evolution itself, seems to fit into these four categories.
The mind and body seem to be hard-wired to achieve these things, and usually in the order mentioned above. And at the root of these goals is our ‘desire’ for them. And arguably, without the impulse to ‘desire’ something, we would never do anything at all.

This tells us something important about ourselves.

We like to think of human beings as rational people, yet desire is very much an emotional state. So seeing it is so important to our survival and achievement, are we really as rational as we think?
I suspect not. Rather, we are what we are because of our emotional desires. And we will crave a particular desire absolutely whenever it enters our mind – even if it is as innocuous as that hamburger.

© Anthony North, January 2008

This is post inspired by a Writers’ Island prompt. Have you had a go yet?

IS FAGIN BACK?

The incorrectly named News at Ten led yesterday with a report of massive police raids around London on Romanian gangs who have been bringing in children as young as 4 to work as beggars and pickpockets …
… read more …

WITH A PINCH OF SALT

There’s a marvelous story doing the rounds of a Goth who leads his girlfriend around on a leash being banned from a bus after being told no dogs allowed. Is this victimization, as is claimed …
… read more …

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WRITERS’ ISLAND

SCRIBBLER’S NEWS - The magazine post for writers
In this issue: Why not take a look at Writers’ Island – a useful little blog … PLUS … advice on how to create a character. And another short short story for you.
YOU KNOW IT’S THE WRITE WAY

WRITERS’ ISLAND

I’m not normally one for memes. I’m a big believer that a writer writes what he wants, and should not be influenced by the ideas of others. Of course, in reality, this latter point is impossible. We are all influenced by a variety of sources.
However, whilst visiting Truth is Freedom, I noticed a link to Writers’ Island. I’d never heard of this before and decided to take a look. What I found was a simple, but excellent idea.

Each Saturday a prompt post appears, in which a subject is given.

The writer then has to write a piece based around the subject. It can be anything – essay, story, poetry. The freedom is total, apart from a quite expansive ‘subject’.
The Tuesday following, another post appears, inviting you to place a url to your piece in the comments. You then read and comment upon the pieces on the writers’ individual blogs.
This seems to me a good way to find an audience, and get feedback on your work. And there appears to be many involved in the project. I may even try it myself.

© Anthony North, January 2008

MORE RAMBLINGS FROM MY ARCHIVES

HOW TO CREATE A CHARACTER

Stories need characters, but if you simply match the character to the story, then it will fail. To create a successful character you need to be much more subtle, and take advantage of a rich storytelling culture that has been around for millennia …
… read more …

Fiction Xtra – THE WISH ROOM - A tale about what happens to the ultimate voyeur

He never realised it would be so lonely. For many years he had shunned people. He felt uncomfortable near them – alien; disturbed in their presence. So it was obvious he would become a hermit, alone with his dreams, his thoughts, his wishes. But even as a hermit it was often impossible to be alone …
… read more …