Peter Bromhead: The International Writer's Block Festival

Cartoon / Peter Bromhead

As guest speaker at the International Writer's Block Festival, I was apprehensive that I might give the anguished attendees too much encouragement.

"Supposing I'm over-enthusiastic?" I mumbled nervously to the caregiver.

"After all, I don't want to give sufferers any hope."

"Look," said the caregiver, "your credentials are impeccable. Who else started a novel in 1975 and still hasn't got beyond chapter two?

"You wouldn't have been invited if you didn't have a distinguished career writing absolutely nothing of consequence - thanks to sheer laziness. Sorry ... I mean as a chronic sufferer of the writer's malady.

"Everybody will be eager to learn from your pain."

"That's true," I mumbled modestly. "I suppose I have a pretty good record for procrastinating whenever the urge to be creative rises."

"It's only a shame your procrastination didn't extend below your belt line," the caregiver added ruefully, patting her expanding abdomen to remind me of a happy event descending on us this year.

Meanwhile, she is helping me collate the papers I plan to hand out on methods of obtaining dubious awards and benefits as a non-performing author.

In a nutshell, my secret for avoiding writer's block is simple. Avoid sitting in front of a computer trying to create in the first place.

When the desire to write percolates, dodge potential impasses by diverting the imagination with something more therapeutic.

I find combinations of alcohol and watching television game shows can numb literary aspirations for months on end.

Another method is to check past royalty payments from your publisher.

This can be profoundly traumatic, leading to permanent writer's block.

I'm pleased to conclude that my appearance at the festival was a success.

My apprehension about addressing wannabe authors proved ill-founded, however.

Thanks to alcohol and jet lag, I managed to befuddle my speech, sprinkling nothing but confusion and despair between long pauses, culminating in a standing ovation when I stood silent for a riveting 12 minutes following an attack of "speaker's block".

My six-page treatise on focal dystonia - encouraging literary no-hopers to combine "writer's cramp" with writer's block to obtain sickness benefits - was well received, particularly when the audience discovered I'd suffered a bad bout of writer's block while preparing my findings, which explained why they were presented as blank sheets of paper with only a header note on each page.