The Inspiration for Writers at Sheldon

Caedin Brown staff writer

Many people only write for school. Some people have a strong passion for writing. There’s many different types of writing such as free writing, song writing, and journalism. Ideas for writing can come from anywhere. English teacher Jesse Lawton, a songwriter at Sheldon said, “I am not quite sure where the ideas came from. I will come up with a line or phrase and then I get another line or phrase for it. I write and then it evolves throughout the writing as it goes.”

English teacher Andrew Cabrera, also a songwriter at Sheldon said, “Lots of the times I get, from books I read or things I teach, inspired from books and poetry and fit them into my songs in less obvious ways, like lines from something I taught or looked at.”

Senior Audrey Chamberlain said, “I have actually gotten a lot of my inspiration from my biology class, especially the units that dealt with genetics. As I am writing a science fiction story, I try to take elements from real life and expand on them by adding my own sort of twist.”

Chamberlain also said, “Another place that I have gotten inspiration from is the author Brandon Sanderson, as his many books have contained, at least in my opinion, some of the best characterization and world building that I have ever seen. I always want to make my characters feel like real people and their cultures feel like real cultures, and I think that Sanderson does that really well. I also get a lot of inspiration from my dad, as we will often discuss story ideas and he helps to refine how it all fits together, and work over things I might be stuck on.”

People have all different amounts of experience in writing. Chamberlain said, “I have been writing since about eighth grade, and I have definitely spent a lot of time working and reworking my stories. It has definitely been a lot of work to develop convincing characters and plot lines, and I have enjoyed watching my stories come together and make good connections. Overall, I would say that writing can be challenging at times, but it is also very rewarding to see something I spent so much time on come to life.”

Writers can be inspired by lots of different people. Lawton said, “One of my favorite writers of all time is Jack Kerouac; he’s a very creative writer. The thing he does is he finds all the beautiful moments throughout everything and how he writes with everything is amazing.”

Writers may not have a favorite piece they have written, while others know of their favorite piece they have written. Lawton said he favors “some albums that I did back in the day because I am a songwriter and I wrote a song called ‘ink got jack.’ I couldn’t say I have a personal favorite because everything I’ve written has been fun.”

Chamberlain said, “My favorite thing that I have written is the current project that I am working on. It is a collection of multiple short stories that all sort of come together to complete an overarching story. The specific story that I am the most proud of is titled, ‘Father Returns,’ and is one the first stories that I have actually gone back and edited, so I feel like it is higher quality than many of the others that I have written. It also contains important interactions between two extremely different cultures, and a look into internalized sexism and the portrayal of gender roles. There are others I have written that I like, but for now, I think that ‘Father Returns’ is the one I am most proud of right now.”

Cabrera said, “I wrote a song called ‘The Woods Are Burning’ about the forest fires and it evolved after a while and I felt like it was one of the only songs that I have written that was fully true because a lot of my songs I write are based on not real things or stories.” There are tons of people who write and hopefully more that will in the future.