The pad of paper by my bedside is now a bona fide tool for self-analysis.
First, the character sketch. I’m not sure if I dreamed him, but when I woke about 2 am, there was this merry little boy, maybe nine years old, just begging to be put down on paper so that the world wouldn’t lose him forever. Or at least so the author wouldn’t. So I jotted some notes. In fact, while I was jotting, I gradually woke more and more and ended up filling the whole four-by-six page. Rather pedestrian imagery… flashing black eyes, dark dark hair, a little bit too long, unbrushed, stone under his bare feet. But more kept fleshing out. It was an underground scene, rows of cells, prison cells, and the boy was running along and peering into the various cells. No one was paying him any attention at all. In fact, as I wrote, I decided this was important. I made him a little more hyperactive. An attention-seeker. He wouldn’t walk from cell to cell, I decided; he’d bound up and down the stone hall...