By Paul Bassett Davies
A writer is like an athlete. Except that a writer sits around all day and doesn't get much exercise. But apart from that, they're very similar, although athletes tend to be better looking. Also, writers disdain the use of performance-enhancing drugs. The problem is, they give you about forty minutes of creative inspiration, then you carry on writing for another nine hours producing what you think is brilliant but turns out, in the morning, to be drivel. So I'm told.
However, in order to remain mentally alert, it's important for a writer to be in peak physical condition. You can always take a break from your work and do some exercise, but be careful you don't start using it as a displacement activity. If you find that you're spending more than twelve hours a day at the gym, you should probably get back to your desk.
But did you know that you can turn routine domestic activities into valuable physical exercise? For example, when you're watching daytime TV for research purposes, get up and walk to the television to change the channel instead of using the remote control. And even when you're having a cup of coffee at your desk, you can exercise your muscles by lifting the full mug up and down with one hand a few times while typing with the other. But be careful you don't spill it on your computx5>$jkq§nnnggggg.
Best to forget about the coffee mug. Ideally, what we're looking for is a way to keep fit by harnessing and transforming creative mental energy. Unfortunately, there isn't one. Mental activity exercises the brain, not the body. So, while your brain develops a six-pack, you're still sitting there in those elastic-waisted trousers you bought from a mail-order ad in the Sunday Telegraph magazine, modelled by creepily spry home counties types who look like retired magistrates.
A possible solution is to combine writing with physical exercise. Why not try a technique I've devised called PlotScotch? On sheets of A4 paper, write down all the plots you can think of, and any you can't as well, turn them over, shuffle them, and lay them out on the floor in the traditional hopscotch pattern. Get hopping, and use the plot you land on. You can then do the same with sub-plots, characters, scenes and dialogue. There are obvious drawbacks to this technique; for example, the results are usually far too sophisticated for most television drama scripts. Also, you can't do it out of doors because the pieces of paper blow away. And, frankly, it's a bit tiring.
The fact is that writing is essentially a sedentary occupation, unless you do it standing up. Which is how Anthony Trollope produced around seventy novels, putting in a couple of hours every morning at a lectern before going off to work in his job at the Post Office. Maybe that's what my postman is doing - writing a novel. He's certainly got something more important to do in the morning than deliver my mail, which arrives around lunchtime.
Trollope wasn't actually a postman, although he did invent the pillar box. (If you win a pub quiz with this piece of trivia, please send me five percent of the prize money or a cheque for five pounds, whichever is the less sticky.) But the combination of writer and postman is, in fact, ideal: a couple of hours of writing in the morning followed by a couple of hours of gentle, well-paid exercise, with the additional amusement of vigorous origami as you devise creative ways to stuff large envelopes through small letter-flaps.
Another option is to actually do your writing while going for a walk. The difficulty with this, I've found, is that you tend to spill your drink and bump into people. In the old days, a major author could solve the problem by having an amanuensis. But for the modern writer, having an amanuensis raises questions, like, "What is it?" "Can I plug it into the USB port of my laptop?" and "Is it tax-deductible?" However, once you know what one is, you'll see how unlikely it is you'll ever get a good one. Boswell may have clambered around the Hebrides behind Dr Johnson, diligently noting down his every thought, but if you really believe that you can find someone who is prepared to follow you around day and night, recording every word you say, and who also happens to be a brilliant author in their own right, then you should ask to have your medication changed.
The modern version of an amanuensis is a small tape recorder, enabling you to dictate your work while doing the shopping. Now that the streets are full of people apparently talking to themselves as they use hands-free mobile phones you won't stand out so much, unless you're doing it without the tape recorder and carrying all your belongings in plastic carrier bags.
But your masterpiece will still need transcribing. If a literary agent, commissioning editor or producer wanted to listen to thousands of words of a writer's unedited prose, all they've got to do is answer the phone. Okay, there are some computer programmes that recognise and transcribe your voice. But the results read like the 'English' instructions for a Japanese washing machine. Of course, if you've got a secretary, they can transcribe your tape. But if you've got a secretary, you've almost certainly got a proper job, so get back to work and stop taking bread out of the mouths of deserving professional writers.
No, you're going to end up back at your desk, re-arranging your paperclip collection and eating chocolate digestive biscuits. And this is where my new invention comes in: the Deskycle. You pedal it around like a bicycle as you write or type at the integrated work station that's attached to the front, while steering with an armature strapped to your chin. Fresh air, exercise and creativity, all in one! It's advisable to improve your touch-typing skills as you'll want to spend at least part of the time looking at the road rather than what you're writing. But I guarantee that you'll have lots of interesting encounters - which you can instantly incorporate into the material you're writing. Especially if it's a gritty drama based on the exciting work of the traffic police.
