Enter The Dragon. Thing. Again.

[bloodyrosemccoy]

Another Look Unlimited Day
Be Late for Something Day
Play Days (09/05-09/09)
Birthday - Jesse James (outlaw)
Birthday - Dweezil Zappa (musician)

 

Oh, lord.

 

The Dragonturtle is back.

 

I hadn’t realized it at first. I was blithely writing along, doing the peculiar science fiction world-building process which I call ‘barfing aliens’—that is, having a ton of ideas for different characters and species and scribbling them all down rapidly so I don’t forget and only later working out the jumble—when suddenly, in the midst of squiddly color-changers and floating bugs and blind pink tribble-like things, there appeared in my head a great big fangly monstrous reptile with a big iridescent shell, sort of like if you crossed Smaug the Dragon with Bowser, King of the Koopas.

 

With a stethoscope around his neck.

 

He grinned expansively, reared back onto his hind limbs, and spread his forelimbs wide.

 

“I’m BAAAACK!” he said.

 

I stared at him. “You want to be a doctor?”

 

“Sure,” he said, twirling the stethoscope through his enormous claws. “If that bunch of monkeys you’ve got can do it, I sure as hell could!”

 

It shouldn’t have occurred to me. This character is not the most obvious choice for my Doctors In SPACE! stories, except maybe as a cause of death. He used to be a villain in the stories I wrote a million years ago as a young ’un, and in them he was a big ugly beady-eyed juggernaut who terrorized the world with his sorcery and his scheming and his enormous claws. He spent his life roaring and rampaging against my intrepid heroes with all the force of a big cartoonily obvious Bad Guy.

 

And he was my absolute favorite character to write. Ever.

 

He just had way too much fun doing the things he did. He in fact genuinely liked several of the heroes and considered them his friends,* and his wars with them were his idea of a friendly game of basketball in the park. He didn’t seem like the type who would make a good surgeon, but when I told him we could give it a shot and stuck him in The Hospital, to my great surprise, it worked very well. He seemed to have gotten over committing anything except the occasional atrocity, and he puts all his energy into intimidation now. And his personality was as wonderfully funny as ever. He does have an appalling bedside manner, but the other doctors assure me that they’re doing everything they can to convince him to stop threatening to eat his patients.

 

So, he gets to be a doctor, and I get to steal an idea from myself.

 

It’s actually a relief to have it that way. The Giant Idea Eggbeater is going as strong as ever, and most of it has to do with other people’s ideas. Sometimes it surprises me what surfaces in my stories, and who I cast as which character. I have one alien doctor who, despite being a large swamp-dwelling six-eyed amphibian, seems to be channelling Major Charles Emerson Winchester, III from M*A*S*H.** A few weeks ago when watching Anastasia again I realized that another of my characters, an old sorcerer, seemed to have appropriated the voice of Vlad. Annie Lennox has made an appearance as an alien before—two different aliens, in fact (because Annie is too awesome to stay one person).*** I think Penn & Teller have made a cameo.

 

I know that writers use ideas from outside sources, but I think it would embarrrass us all to explore just how much of what we have written stems from someone else’s writing. It’s something of a relief when the person you’re borrowing from is yourself, because you know you’re not going to raise a ruckus about it.

 

Sometimes, you might even be pleasantly surprised at the results. I sure was. Welcome to The Hospital, Dragonturtle.

 

 

*Although they might have argued that point.

 

**I realized this when he was talking to another character, a Dr. Harcourt, and he snapped “Shut up, Haahcouht!”

 

***Holy shite, I just realized that I have set a new record by mentioning three people in a row who fall into my category of “People Whose Voices Are The Sex”: David Ogden Stiers, Kelsey Grammer, and Annie Lennox. Obviously I have something for voices.

EDIT: Sorry.  Forgot to cut it.

Comments

[bluetara2020.livejournal.com]

*grins* I like him already.

And I am so with you on the voices thing...yummy yum yum.

[(Anonymous)]

Have you ever watched the show 'House' with the crazy doctor who is always on drugs? For some reason your brief description of the turtledragon intimidating people made me think of him.
~Liz (who really should stop watching TV all the time)

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

As far as I know, House doesn't routinely describe the horrible cooking methods he's going to use on the patient, or solicit their cooperation by roaring in their faces with a mouthful of fangs that would make a shark think twice.

But then, I've only seen like half of one episode, so you never know.

[chibicharibdys.livejournal.com]

Gosh, did I ever mention that I love you?

I mean, you write all the things that I would write if I hadn't decided to take myself (or at least, my fictional worlds) so darn seriously.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_wastrel/]

I know that writers use ideas from outside sources, but I think it would embarrrass us all to explore just how much of what we have written stems from someone else’s writing.

My approach to it is either that ideas are existing letters which I put together to form new words or existing words themselves which I use to form new sentences with. Any idiot can steal two or three ideas, but it's a little more than that to put together five or six in a new way that works.

I also think that Kelsey Grammer's voice almost makes up for his appearance. If he looked like Beast all the time, he'd be unstoppable. :D

[padparadscha.livejournal.com]

I know you watch DS9, but did you ever see Star Trek: TNG? There's an episode where Data is angsting again about his violin and how he's not creative, he just blends the styles of X, Y, and Z famous violinists, and Picard points out that in order to blend such radically differing styles Data had to add something to the mix. I thought that was cool. And JK Rowling once said something about how ideas are like compost, in that other people's ideas break down in your head and that's where your own ideas grow.

The funny thing is that the guy who stole his voice looks nothing like either Beast OR Grammer. He's a short, wiry, lazy old cynic with shaggy salt-and-pepper hair, and he glows in the dark and can make hurricanes if he's had enough caffeine. It surprises me how much a voice can make or break characters independent of looks, though ~ if my mind assigns them a particular voice, I'm more interested in them, and it also sends their personalities in specific directions.

[http://users.livejournal.com/_wastrel/]

Heh, not only have I seen TNG, I'm actually going as Data next Halloween after having realized just how similar he is to myself in so many slightly disturbing ways (maybe a bit of Lore, too...). Where do you think Elizabeth got her love of Earl Grey tea from? :>

I've used the compost metaphor in an old entry of mine about writing, actually - tell Rowling I say hello. ;-) Every character I read or write has a very specific voice of their own, and it does affect my perception of them to a surprising extent.