Author Shane Dunphy on how, for a writer, ‘having a special place to create is essential’.
Ernest Hemingway famously wrote standing up – he maintained that it kept him alert and made him feel like he was REALLY working, doing something active and dynamic. He also recommended drinking only wine when he wrote, as he found consuming spirits caused his books to become too frenetic and impulsively plotted (I believe he abandoned this rule as he got older, and often wrote with a bottle of whiskey on board).
It puzzles me that a professional writer had to fool himself into thinking he was really working. I don’t get that. I love to write, but I am under no illusion that it is anything BUT work.
And (for me, anyway) it requires consistency and discipline.
Hemingway’s idea did get me thinking about the mechanics of writing, though. I think it’s quite an important topic.
How we write is almost as significant as what we write.
I had the good fortune to encounter one of Charles Dickens’ writing desks while working on a documentary in the UK, and found it quite an emotional meeting. It is a gorgeous thing made of what looks like burnished oak, a deep, dark brown colour, still gleaming with polish and pitted with marks of age. The thought that one of my heroes created so many books that meant so much to me while seated at that very piece of furniture was quite humbling, and brought on a severe bout of Imposter Syndrome, causing me to doubt if I was even worthy to be in the same space as such an artefact.
Looking back over my writing career, there have been a few corners where I have done a lot of my creating, but none quite so beautiful as that ancient piece of woodwork.
For many years I had an office in my house, which almost always resembled a junk room. I cleared it up intermittently, but usually within the space of a matter of weeks stuff from the rest of the house that was in need of a home found its way in there (it never seemed to matter how much storage space we had, it was never enough). So when I was in my home office I was always surrounded by boxes of papers that needed filing, Christmas decorations, my grandson’s car-seat (that’s where it lived when we took it out of the car to make room for an extra adult passenger) and any amount of other stuff. I want to add here that I was as much to blame as anyone in the family for this state of affairs (I’m getting in there before someone else does!)
Finally, fed up with the state of my home office and of how difficult it could be to work while a noisy and boisterous family did its thing, I claimed our garden shed for writing. I moved in an old couch that was once in our living room and was still incredibly comfortable, and added the centre piece of an old dining table. This I put across the arms of the couch to make a desktop, on which I sat my laptop and the endless cups of tea I drink while I write (sorry Hemingway, for me it’s Barry’s Tea that is the essential fuel for writing). I put some pictures on the wall – some photos of my family, a large poster of Mohammed Ali flooring Joe Frasier that I’d had for years, and an old keytar that used to belong to my son when he was small hung by the door. I had a lamp and a side-table to put pens and notebooks and that was about it.
I found it quite amazing how, as soon as I walked down the garden and opened that door, I was in another world. It was quiet (there were fruit trees directly behind, and my work there was always done with the soundtrack of birdsong in my ears). The windows didn’t open, so I left the door open to various degrees dependent on temperature, so I could gaze out at the weather and the texture of light as the day altered. My dogs, George and Lulu, often came out to join me, sleeping at my feet as I worked, or going out for a bit of a run around the garden before returning.
I wrote the last two Dunnigan books mostly in my shed, and my Audible-only series, Stories From the Margins, was written out there completely – every word of it.
The Writing Shed was an essential part of my process. I thank Roald Dahl, Neil Gaiman and Nicholas Briggs for giving me the idea. I think every writer should have one.
Alas, life got in the way, and my Writing Shed (which unbeknownst to me was riddled with woodworm and damp) had to be destroyed.
So an alternative needed to be found.
And luckily, the universe delivered one just at the right time.
I was given a promotion in the college where I teach, and the position came with an office. It became my new place to write, and it is a perfect space for me (see the photo). It is light and airy and (during holiday times and evenings, at least) undisturbed. I feel very comfortable there.
Bizarrely, it is a space I used before it ever was my office. It’s funny how we gravitate to certain locations, but about six or seven years ago, the room which is now my office in WCFE was a classroom. When I was writing my book The Girl Who Couldn’t Smile, I needed somewhere quiet to work. The students were all away on placement, and I got all my visits done early, and went looking for somewhere to write. I found a small classroom in a remote corner of the college, which was unused. I piled some desks up to make a cubicle for myself and settled in beside a window that gave me lots of natural light.
That very window is behind me now as I write this. Somehow, fate conspired to make the room mine, in the end, and I love it. When I work there I am surrounded by art I love (I have a lot of pictures students have done for me), books I treasure, collectibles and lots of other odds and ends that make me feel at home (I’ve included a shot of a couple of my office bookshelves). One of my students pointed out that the room looks as if my personality exploded all over the room. She’s probably right, too.
I often choose to work there at night, when the college is empty of staff and students, and I feel as if my little space is an island in a sea of darkness and quietude. I have a kettle for my essential and regular doses of tea, and a drawer at my knee to house my research notebooks. A Bluetooth speaker sits atop a stack of books on an unused radiator (it hasn’t worked in years, and I replaced it with an electric heater for cold days) and if I feel the need to listen to music, which I often do when I’m writing non-fiction, I can synch up my phone and listen to my heart’s content.
I’ve probably done the best writing of my career in this space. The Girl Who Couldn’t Smile, which I wrote here before the room was even officially mine went to Number 5 on the London Times Bestseller list, and title I ghost wrote went to Number 1 in Ireland. My entire Tessa Burns series was written here, and I truly believe it is my finest work of crime fiction so far.
The room and all it contains adds to the process. It helps the words to breathe and the narrative to flow.
I believe that, for any writer, having a special place to create is essential.
It is as significant as having that germ of an idea and a command of the language.
If you don’t have one, find one as soon as you can.
(c) Shane Dunphy (also writing as S.A. Dunphy)
Read more from Shane Dunphy on Writing.ie here.
About Her Lonely Soul by S.A. Dunphy:
‘I’ve come to report a murder,’ the little girl declares, lips trembling, her head only just high enough to see over the police counter. ‘Please, you have to help me.’
When tearful young Ellie O’Farrell walks into a rural Irish police station to report she’s dreamed a murder that hasn’t happened yet, she is gently, but firmly, sent on her way. But the very next night a beloved local grandfather is found dead, lethal knife wounds showing a struggle exactly as she’d described. How did innocent Ellie know what was going to happen?
Called in to investigate, Detective Tessa Burns has never seen anything like this. Meeting Ellie and her desperate parents, it’s clear Ellie’s home is filled with love. She swears she has never met the victim: Tessa’s case seems to stall before it’s even begun. But when Tessa gets a frantic call from the young girl only days later to say she’s had a terrifying second dream, the race is on to prevent another murder.
Was Tessa’s usually flawless instinct about Ellie’s home life wrong? Has Ellie overheard something she shouldn’t? With only hours to go until Ellie’s terrible prediction comes true, Tessa is shocked to get a deadly warning from someone in her own dark past. Leave the case alone, or she – and Ellie – are next.
Tessa refuses to stop her investigation – it’s the only way to save Ellie. But then a deadly attack leaves Tessa’s team fighting for their lives, and Ellie taken… Tessa would risk everything to unmask the most twisted killer she’s ever encountered. But first she must rescue Ellie, before it’s too late for them all…
A totally unputdownable Irish police procedural with jaw-dropping twists. Perfect for fans of Patricia Gibney, Lisa Regan and Angela Marsons.
Order your copy of Her Lonely Soul by S.A. Dunphy online here.
