Writing and Film

I guess I was about eight or nine — maybe younger — when I wrote a story for school that I was rather proud of.

"It was a starless night, only the moon shone through my window...." — I found this opening both poetic and mysterious. However, the only other thing I remember about the whole exercise is my teacher writing 'If it was a starless night there could be no moon' in red ink in the margin.

That comment was probably responsible for putting a major brake on my career as a novelist.

From that point on I only felt capable of writing the odd poem, short articles for publication (nothing more glamorous than a local newspaper) and lyrics inspired by music composed by my husband, Dylan.

I certainly did not think of myself as a writer.

On the other hand, and in spite of having studied ballet for 17 years and worked as a professional dancer at the Lido in Paris, I did not consider myself a dancer. Yet again, in spite of being quite a capable crafts person and having sold scarves and pieces of clothing made out of silk I had painted, I certainly didn't feel like a visual artist. In spite of playing the guitar and having a repertoire of about 500 songs, I didn't consider myself a musician or singer. The list goes on.

By the time I was nearly forty, I had been educated in English, Spanish and French, had lived in six countries, and was now living in Germany. I was pretty fluent in all four languages, but hardly a master in any.

When the book, The Artist's Way, fell into my lap, I thought it looked interesting and might help me get a sense of direction within the area of silk painting I was involved in at the time. For those who don't know this book, the author, Julia Cameron, sets out a series of weekly exercises aimed at helping the reader re-discover the artist within. Her starting point is the belief that everyone is creative in some way or another.

To my surprise, the exercises quickly set me on the road to writing again and by the time I was finished I could say, with a feeling of absolute certainty: "I am a writer". I could say this, regardless of two facts; first, that I still had a long way to go to becoming a 'good' writer and second, that I had never been paid to write anything. These two points seemed insignificant compared to the fact that I could say, without hesitation, "I am a writer".

The next step was to practise the art of writing, listen to people's criticism (constructive I hope) of my style and overcome the blocks that my early education had planted in my brain. Help came when I was discussing an idea for a movie that I had had for a couple of years with a friend involved in the business. He assured me that I didn't need to write a whole screenplay; a four page treatment, encapsulating the whole idea and setting up the classic structure for a feature film, could be enough to actually sell something, if one gets it into the hands of the right person. 'I can manage four pages' I decided, and set about doing just that.

Before I knew it, I was having such fun working on the dialogue, that I just ploughed on through till I had a completed script.

Where am I today? Well, my writing has improved, though I still have a long way to go, but I still haven't been paid for anything I've written. However, all is not entirely bleak in that area either. I recently wrote lyrics for a band that actually has a record deal, and have been asked to write more, so the royalties may just start pouring in. The screenplay has been revised a few times and is now being sent out into the big wide world. I've also written quite a number of short pieces and have started a novel.

Maybe there was something to the fact that, years ago in Barcelona, when I was typing up letters for Bapak, he passed by, nodded and said: "Ya"!

© Osanna Vaughn, Hamburg 1999

GOD'S BEARD

God was getting a little bored just KNOWING how great He was. He wanted more. He wanted to EXPERIENCE His own magnificence. So He created the Universe. Black holes, dust particles and everything in between.

Then he trimmed His Beard!

He caught the trimmings carefully in a paper bag (after all they were part of His Splendorous Self, imbued with all His creative power) and sent Them to the wardrobe department where They are got fitted with astral bodies. From there They went to the auditions and were given the chance to choose which role They would each play in the coming production (things work differently in Heaven to Broadway) and "carte blanche" to improvise.

Finally, Each on cue, They made Their way to a distant planet and stepped into the bodies They would be occupying for the run of the show.

At first, everything went smoothly. Each millisecond brought a new and marvellous experience that God was able to partake in thanks to His Beard Trimmings. Due to the laws of relativity He too had created, He was able to feel cold and hot, taste sweet and sour, see far and near and experience happiness and sadness. It was all very wonderful.

However, somewhere along the line — quite soon in fact — the Beard Trimmings began to forget the magnificent Beard They had been trimmed from. They began to forget that this show They were starring in would have a limited run. However successful, one day it would come to an end and, even before that, many of the participants would be leaving. They actually began to believe that the performance was all that there was! Only at night, when Their characters went to sleep, were the astral bodies able to put aside the costumes for a while and take a spin through the Cosmos. Still, when Their costumes awoke each morning, the memories of Their travels would soon evaporate, being taken as simple dreams and imaginings of ever active minds.

God felt rather sorry about this because His Beard Trimmings were no longer having as much fun as They could be. He was still delighted with all the dramas and success stories going on, but His Children (as He fondly liked to call his Beard Trimmings) were becoming more and more afraid. Was there a life beyond the run of the show? Would Their performance be so harshly judged that They might be banished somewhere horrible forever? Might They be kicked out prematurely? All these worries began to weigh more and more on Them, just because they simply couldn't remember the Truth.

Of course, God did what He could to help Them. He sent messages in one form or another pretty consistently — at least once a week. He breathed a sigh of relief every time one of His Children acknowledged the message and tried to spread the word around. Basically, "Don't worry, be happy!" For a while the general mood would lighten up but, sooner or later, the fear would take over again and the feeling would drop like a rock in a pond.

Finally God decided to put His Children out of Their misery so He closed the show. What's more, he did it with a Big Bang. Well, actually He let His Children do it. It's fair to say that it was rather exaggerated, but it did have the advantage of leaving the planet swept totally clean, even if unusable for a few Millennia.

After it was all over, the Beard Trimmings — happily assimilated again into the Holy Beard — couldn't believe They'd taken it all so seriously. What had They been thinking?!?