The Problem with Awe

It’s a strange expression, if you slow to a stop and think through the words, ‘took my breath away’ it seems to have two meanings; something utterly shocking or beautiful that causes you to gasp – to breathe in, or to suddenly exhale. 

Does anyone travel through life without having a few such moments? It seems unlikely. I’ve had a few. 

One was a piece of music on a Radio 4 programme I was listening to whilst driving. It was so beautiful I had to stop, it wasn’t safe to continue through a blur of tears. Or a beautiful woman I had the honour of meeting and knowing. My socks were truly blown clean off and away. And two paintings. One, as far as I know, is still in the Bristol Museum, and the other (a relatively inexpensive print, not, alas, the original) hangs in my house. Both made me stand and stare.

Then there’s mist in the hollows on an autumnal morning, a sunset across the ocean, the crash of a wave on shingle beach, or the particular blue of a cold January sky…I could go on.

All good, but then there’s a sinister side of awe. In writing. 

When, as a writer, you encounter writing that is nigh on perfect and seems to occupy some impenetrable place reserved for an unapproachable elite, it can, I find, either be inspiring or leave you feeling rather naked, longing for a few fig leaves to cover up you're own threadbare attempts.

One recent example. I enjoy reading Nick Cave’s The Red Hand Files, a weekly letter replying to a few questions posed to him by adoring fans. But the quality of Nick Cave’s replies, his ability to interweave ideas, meditations, poetic imagery, humour, and plain good advice and common sense, is…depending on the mood I’m in…either dispiriting or uplifting.

Another author I may have mentioned before that has that seemingly casual inability to write a single sentence that is not worth rereading…no, not Shakespeare, Dostoyevsky, or Steinbeck…but Ian Rankin. No fillers, no unnecessary descriptive interludes, no fat, it’s pared to the bone and yet entirely nourishing. How does he do it?

Here’s a sentence that I particularly liked, from this week’s Red Hand Files, where Nick Cave is relaying to a fan something of the agony he goes through in writing the first two lines of a song, ‘the unpredictable arrival of those first two lines’:

‘Within those few words lies the ‘beautiful idea’ and the inception of that idea is fundamentally unstable, unreliable, and deeply mysterious’

None of us can ever write entirely in the style of another. Let us not despair, but learn. Let us be open, influenced, inspired, and aspire to write well, to improve, and yet be content, and continue to convert our ‘beautiful ideas’ into poetry and prose, novels and non-fiction.

St Paul said ‘I have learned to be content. I know how to be based, and I know how to abound…I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.’

So far, I’ve read this blog post through once or twice, tweaked this verb, that sentence, and cut and pasted a paragraph…I’m almost content to leave it and push on until August. Almost.

If you're curious, you can find my other attempts to convert beautiful ideas into poetry, meditations, rants, and more at www.unlessaseed.com . 

I hope to see you there!