The Best Writing Tips Ever

I've been in publishing for more than 20 years, I've attended my fair share of writer's conferences and workshops, and in my experience, the poet Allen Ginsberg was one of the best writing teachers I ever encountered. What he cared most about in his students was authenticity, and over the years he developed a series of slogans--some of which he wrote, others he took from great poets and writers--to guide people on the path to developing a clear, true and strong voice.

I was lucky enough to know Allen during the last eight years of his life, and one day in his office, I think it was 1990, or 1991, he handed me his list of "Mind Writing Slogans." I was astonished, reading suggestions such as "Notice what you notice," by how closely they resembled instructions in what I would soon discover was Allen's deep meditation practice. In both meditation and in writing, Allen tried to help students learn to watch their mind and express their thoughts spontaneously in order to tap the spring of creativity that produced Ginsberg's greatest work.

I have been sharing these slogans with the writers I've worked with over the years in different publishing houses, and for many authors, they have acted as catalysts, breaking through anything from solving a structural conundrum to bringing a long case of writer's block to an end. When we started the books page, I contacted Ginsberg's literary estate to see if we could post the slogans, and happily, the answer was "yes."

We'd love to hear what you think of these, and if you find them useful.

Two decades' experiences teaching poetics at Naropa Institute, half decade at Brooklyn College, and occasional workshops at Zen Center & Shambhala/Dharmadhatu weekends have been boiled down to brief mottoes from many sources found useful to guide myself and others in the experience of "writing the mind." --Allen Ginsberg

ALLEN GINSBERG'S MIND WRITING SLOGANS

"First thought is best in Art, second in other matters." --William Blake

I. GROUND (Situation, or Primary Perception)

1. "First Thought, Best Thought" --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
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2. "Take a friendly attitude toward your thoughts." --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
3. "The Mind must be loose." --John Adams
4. "One perception must immediately and directly lead to a further perception." --Charles Olson, "Projective Verse"
5. "My writing is a picture of the mind moving." --Philip Whalen
6. Surprise Mind --Allen Ginsberg
7. "The old pond, a frog jumps in, Kerplunk!" --Basho
8. "Magic is the total delight (appreciation) of chance" --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
9. "Do I contradict myself?
   Very well, then I contradict myself,
   (I am large. I contain multitudes.)" --Walt Whitman
10. "...What quality went to form a man of achievement, especially in literature? ...Negative capability, that is, when a man is capable of being in uncertainties, mysteries, doubts, without any irritable reaching after fact & reason." --John Keats
11. "Form is never more than an extension of content." --Robert Creeley to Charles Olson
12. "Form follows function." --Frank Lloyd Wright
13. Ordinary Mind includes eternal perceptions. --A.G.
14. "Nothing is better for being Eternal
    Nor so white as the white that dies of a day." --Louis Zukofsky

15. Notice what you notice. --A.G.
16. Catch yourself thinking. --A.G.
17. Observe what's vivid. --A.G.
18. Vividness is self-selecting. --A.G.
19. "Spots of Time" --William Wordsworth
20. If we don't show anyone we're free to write anything. --A.G.
21. "My mind is open to itself." --Gelek Rinpoche
22. "Each on his bed spoke to himself alone, making no sound." --Charles Reznikoff


II. PATH (Method or Recognition)

23. "No ideas but in things." "...No ideas but in the Facts." --William Carlos Williams
24. "Close to the nose." --W.C.Williams
25. "Sight is where the eye hits." --Louis Zukofsky
26. "Clamp the mind down on objects." --W.C.Williams
27. "Direct treatment of the thing..." (or object.)" --E.Pound, 1912
28. "Presentation, not reference..." --Ezra Pound
29. "Give me a for instance." --Vernacular
30. "Show not tell." --Vernacular
31. "The natural object is always the adequate symbol." --Ezra Pound
32. "Things are symbols of themselves." --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
33. "Labor well the minute particulars, take care of the little ones
    He who would do good for another must do it in minute particulars
    General Good is the plea of the Scoundrel Hypocrite and Flatterer
    For Art & Science cannot exist but in minutely organized particulars" --William Blake
34. "And being old she put a skin/On everything she said." --W.B.Yeats
35. "Don't think of words when you stop but to see the picture better." --Jack Kerouac
36. "Details are the Life of Prose." --Jack Kerouac
37. Intense fragments of spoken idiom, best. --A.G.
38. "Economy of Words" --Ezra Pound
39. "Tailoring" --Gregory Corso
40. Maximum information, minimum number of syllables. --A.G.
41. Syntax condensed, sound is solid. --A.G.
42. Savor vowels, appreciate consonants. --A.G.
43. "Compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in sequence of a metronome." --Ezra Pound
44. "...awareness...of the tone leading of the vowels." --Ezra Pound
45. "...an attempt to approximate classical quantitative meters..." --Ezra Pound
46. "Lower limit speech, upper limit song" --Louis Zukofsky
47. "Phanopoeia, Melopoeia, Logopoeia." --Ezra Pound
48. "Sight, Sound & Intellect." --Louis Zukofsky
49. "Only emotion objectified endures." -- Louis Zukofsky


III. FRUITION (Result or Appreciation)

50. Spiritus = Breathing = Inspiration = Unobstructed Breath
51. "Alone with the Alone" --Plotinus
52. Sunyata (Skt.) = Ku (Japanese) = Emptiness
53. "What's the sound of one hand clapping?" --Zen Koan
54. "What's the face you had before you were born?" --Zen Koan
55. Vipassana (Skt.) = Clear Seeing
56. "Stop the world" --Carlos Casteneda
57. "The purpose of art is to stop time." --Bob Dylan
58. "The unspeakable visions of the individual." --J.K.
59. "I'm going to try speaking some reckless words, and I want you to try to listen recklessly." --Chuang Tzu, (Tr. Burton Watson)
60. "Candor" --Whitman
61. "One touch of nature makes the whole world kin." --Shakespeare
62. "Contact" --A Magazine, Nathaniel West & W.C. Williams, Eds.
63. "God Appears & God is Light
    To those poor Souls who dwell in Night
    But does a Human Form Display
    To those who Dwell in Realms of day." --W. Blake
64. Subject is known by what she sees. --A.G.
65. Others can measure their visions by what we see. --A.G.
66. Candor ends paranoia. --A.G.
67. "Willingness to be Fool." --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
68. "day & night/you're all right" --Corso
69. Tyger: "Humility is Beatness." --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche & A.G.
70. Lion: "Surprise Mind" --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche & A.G.
71. Garuda: "Crazy Wisdom Outrageousness" --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
72. Dragon: "Unborn Inscrutability" --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
73. "To be men not destroyers" --Ezra Pound
74. "Speech synchronizes mind & body." --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
75. "The Emperor unites Heaven & Earth." --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
76. "Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world." --Shelley
77. "Make it new" --Ezra Pound
78. "When the mode of music changes, the walls of the city shake" --Plato
79. "Every third thought shall be my grave" --W. Shakespeare, "The Tempest"
80. "That in black ink my love may still shine bright" --W. Shakespeare, Sonnets
81. "Only emotion endures" --Ezra Pound
82. "Well while I'm here I'll
    do the work--
    and what's the Work?
    To ease the pain of living.
    Everything else, drunken
    dumbshow." --A.G.

83. "...Kindness, sweetest
    of the small notes

    in the world's ache,
    most modest & gentle
    of the elements

    entered man before history
    and became his daily
    connection, let no man

    tell you otherwise." --Carl Rakosi

Take a look at what else is going on in Allen Ginsberg's work.

Comments

[garygach]

.
am glad to read your brief memoir of ginzie, amy ( ¿ material you cld expand upon one day ? ) — & what the comments have been saying so positively ... ... i published both his mind writing slogans & exercises in my anthology "what book!?" because they ARE poetry ... I.E., i read the list of slogans as a (3-part) poem ... ... have also used them as prompts for collaborative writing online ( similar to "renga" )

as a writer who meditates ( and a meditator who writes ) for me they're not only point of reference but also point of view

palms
joined

_/|\_

p s
am curious how the 2 films about howl will come out

[Erzsebet Gilbert]

Excellent scraps of advice to read and to mouth to oneself, in times of dis-inspiration or its shiny opposite...
I always liked this one, too, from Proust:
"Style has nothing to do with embellishment, as some people think; it’s not even a matter of technique.
Like the color sense in some painters, it’s a quality of vision, the revelation of the particular universe that each of us sees and that no one else sees. The pleasure an artist offers us is to convey another universe to us."

[IDIOTA]

If Morning Joe were Star Trek...

Joe Scarborough would have to be the captain, for obvious reasons, and that would make Mika the first officer. Joe is more like Kirk than Picard, and one can image him zipping around the galaxy full-throttle at maximum warp with first officer Mika reminding him that, since current warp technology pollutes the fabric of space time, Starfleet authorizes high warp only for exigencies, until greener warp technology becomes available.

Mike Barnicle is Bones; he hates the transporter and Twitter. "I'm a doctor, not some damned tweeting bird." The president of the Federation of Planets, Barack Obama, is, like Spock, a human-Vulcan hybrid. Pat Buchanan, a former candidate for President of the Federation, teaches at Starfleet Academy, and he has misgivings about the President's friendly overtures to the Romulans who allied with the Federation to help defeat the Dominion. Senator Halperin, a Vulcan hawk, has the same misgivings, and fears that the Romulans, who are cousins of the Vulcans, plan to invade Vulcan. Governor Palin, of the Wasilly Colony, has reported that she can see the Neutral Zone from her outpost and that the Romulans are amassing. Ambassador Beck from Inversia has been spreading the rumor that President Obama is actually a Romulan.

To end this ridiculousness, Willie Geist, because he is a baby with his own show, is Wesley Crusher.

[escribacat]

Stories are not explanations. -- Amy Hempel.

[Joe McMahon]

"One perception must immediately and directly lead to a further perception." --Charles Olson, "Projective Verse"

This is challenging. One great sentence is an accomplishment that can feel monumental. But that sentence or perception needs to be followed by another then another.

A creative writing teacher gave me a great note of advise (and he probably got it from someone else), but that was "stop trying to make everything great." A lot of young writers try to write something epic right away, but writing is nothing more than showing up every day to write. If you write every day eventually good writing will happen, and it will seem to come easy compared to the writings you tried to make great.

[BlackJAC]

* "Don't use the company computer to write your book."--me
* "Be aware the genre you like to read may not be the genre you can write."--also me
* "Plot is everything."--me again
* "Never underestimate the power of a good title."--you guessed it, me

[Knowitall]

For some reason all the comments on this page are in RED letters. It's hurting my eyes and I don't know whether it's just my computer or the page is supposed to be like this. Be that as it may, I can't take it anymore, so I'll see you all later.

[escribacat]

Looks normal to me.

[IDIOTA]

I find it hard to enjoy long form fiction because I am always tempted to deconstruct rather than allow myself to be enveloped by the narrative. I find that I can read short stories because it is easier to include the entire scope of the tale in my head as I try to deduce its structure and secrets.

I find that short stories reveal themselves in stages. Rereading an excellent short story is necessary in order to fully grasp the writer's achievement.

[IDIOTA]

I am curious about those who are attracted to this post. I am glad to see that rancor doesn't rule everywhere at HP.

Call me corny, but this feels good.

[brod]

Thanks Amy- I was lucky enough to encounter Ginsburg in the 90's
and he gave me this same list - photocopied and rubber-stamped with his post office box.
The list is now worn and tattered but always with me.

[nicole473]

[Knowitall]

Can't hear you......

[WakingLife]

Really interesting article. I'll have to bookmark this one. I love to read and write. I picked up reading again after many years away. But writing has been a good deal harder.

[Oleg1]

"Compose in the sequence of the musical phrase, not in sequence of a metronome." --Ezra Pound

They say the best art ( and poetry) approaches the condition of music.

[Oleg1]

Things are symbols of themselves." --Chögyam Trungpa, Rinpoche
IMHO, very very HO, Rinpoche may have meant:

"appearance of things are symbols of themselves."

[djekizian]

Very interesting