Where I Write

[Franca Leeson]

In the what-a-great-idea department, someone has set up a website of photos of science fiction writers in the places that they write. Which brings to mind the fact that, although we may get our best ideas in the shower, the heavy lifting of creativity generally has to take place in a very specifically constructed environment. Click here to see the website in question.

[Thomas Teepe]

Hi Franca, years ago I read Arno Schmidt's "Der Platz an dem ich schreibe" ("The place where I write").
It's available on the web here .
I hope the German language community at the hub will enjoy it.

[Franca Leeson]

Damn, my German sucks. Can you translate a snippet?

[Thomas Teepe]

The introduction is about authors and readers: An authors thinks "walking cane in a petticoat" when his readers think "umbrella".

Schmidt then describes in detail his writing table and the two collections of books on it - one fixed set of books, dictionaries for his work as a translator, reference books etc., and a floating set of books for his current work as a writer.

What is most remarkable about the short text is Schmidt's unique writing style, for which the term "idiosyncratic" seems to have been coined, a rollercoaster trip between erudition and the vernacular. My English is not up to a translation.

Schmidt is famous for his use of slip boxes ("Zettelkasten"). Here is a wiki image.

[Franca Leeson]

Cool! Love those slip boxes, I want to reach out and run my hands over them.

[Susan Abbott]

Very interesting photos. I note how many have a companion animal. The slip boxes are very interesting. Would love to understand more about how the author uses them.