Essayist Maria Popova recently sat down with David Perell to discuss her research and writing processes. While she is primarily in the blog and essay space, I think a lot of her advice and processes can translate well to screenwriting.
Let’s take a look at some of her points and advice and talk about how you can best implement them into your own work.
Research Away From the Internet
No one is going to dispute that the Internet is one of the most valuable resources and tools that we have in the modern age. Information is accessible today in a way that even we ourselves ten years ago would likely find bizarre. With that said, the Internet can sometimes have blind spots, or contain caricatures of information that is more accurately reported in other ways.
Popova discusses her time in libraries and academic archives for her research on various works that she has published, which are only available in those locations. Lectures with important figures, essays by accomplished scholars, completely undigitized, and stored in a spooky basement in Manhattan.
This isn’t me telling you to infiltrate the New York Public Library’s archives for your next romantic comedy script, but the sentiment is an interesting one. Being able to use more classic resources outside of the internet for research and development in any work of art is an exercise not only in patience, but in broadening your skill set. People watching, interviewing strangers, immersing yourself in an environment you want to depict outside of a Wikipedia article. Try something new in your planning stages. You won’t regret it.
‘Presence Over Productivity’
‘Superbad’Credit: Columbia Pictures
A lot of what this point comes down to is not forcing yourself to be productive in an environment that doesn’t work for you. Learning about what the greatest writers in history did in their routines is fun anecdotally, but none of that matters if that little quirk doesn’t work for you, even if it did for Edgar Allen Poe.
A good way to take the pressure off of yourself and have fun discovering how your routine works is to just do your daily routine as normal, and see if you can integrate thinking about your work into it naturally.
Popova talks about how much walking every day does for her writing, in that she thinks about her writing so much on her daily walks without distractions that any work she does at her computer is more transcription than actual pen-to-paper writing.
This point hit hard for me, personally, because this is a practice I’ve implemented independently in my own process. I often go for walks at night and listen to music that fits the tone of what I’m working on. Sometimes I strike gold and rush home to transcribe my thoughts, and other times, I strike out and don’t write anything. But at least I got my steps in!
Guys…You Have to Read Books and Watch Movies
This may sound like a bit of a moot point, but you’d be shocked at how many people I’ve come across that want to be film directors that don’t care about watching movies. Furthermore, you’d probably be even more flabbergasted at how many people want to write screenplays, but turn their nose up at the thought of reading The Hunger Games.
The evolution of art through influence is a concept that seems so visible, and yet it gets swept under the rug for so many people. All of your favorite works of film and literature of the past twenty years did not just spawn that way. They’re all pulling from works of their medium and beyond from decades, sometimes centuries prior.
Not only is this important for scholarly education, but it can really give you a better understanding of what moves you, personally. There are some movies from my childhood that I worshipped, that if I were to watch again now, I’d think I was nuts for ever being swept away in it. Inversely, there are works that I despised as a kid that are now all-time favorites. This process does more for forming your own style than you may realize. Don’t underestimate it.
Summing These Points Up
There is a lot more to this interview that we could discuss in more detail, but for the sake of time, let’s just boil down the points discussed here. You can be given all of the advice in the world, but just the same as art is a subjective medium for enjoyment, it’s also a subjective medium for creation. There is no right or wrong way to go about things; you just have to make sure you do it. Have respect for methods presented to you, and have respect for yourself to say something may not work once you’ve tried it. Share your work, and share your process. The rest will follow.
