INSPIRATIONS FROM AFAR: What, beyond writing, nourishes you and your work?

Tricia Guild’s book Inspiration is a gorgeous visual encyclopedia of one creative person's sources of creative stimulation and refreshment.

Among her inspirations are porcelain. Cuban cars. The Amalfi coast. Vintage fashion photography. Garden designer Arne Maynard. The Memphis Glass collective. And a score or three of other, equally vivid and idiosyncratic things.

Here’s my theory: interesting artists of all kinds are interested in things of all kinds. They are informed by work in their own field, but they’re also inspired by things far beyond it. Their far-flung inspirations help give them a rich creative vocabulary, a connection to the world beyond their own discipline or genre, and a way of recharging their batteries when their work sputters to a halt.

You don’t need to be inspired by any of the things Guild is. You don’t need to be inspired by visual things at all. Maybe your own non-writing inspirations come from music. Or nature. Church. Food. Travel. Psychotherapy. Civil War battlefields. Cinema noir. Sixties television. Your grandmother’s letters. Volcanic eruption. Geodesic domes.

I don’t think it matters much what inspires, excites, and renews you. What matters is having non-writing inspirations to turn when your writing well runs dry, and feeling a genuine passion for them.