Chapter 3 Chapter 3 Setting of traps

Q: Where do good ideas come from?How to expand it?How should the trap be set?Please enlighten me. Shimada: Just as there are people with special talents in this world, there are people in this world who can write good novels.Like many of the questions you've asked me before, this one is still beyond my reach, and I may seem a bit incompetent as an answerer. However, people who do well have a commonality in daily life, that is, they are good at observation.They observe the scenery, the means of transportation, the surrounding environment, the things they hold, the shoes and clothes they wear, the books they read, the TV they watch, and so on.At the same time, they are thinking about which of these things can be used in novels, and this habit has become a way of life for them.

Good ideas and good traps do not come out all at once, but only after a process.After an idea comes out, there are countless situations that have to be discarded in the end.Usually pay attention to the accumulation of these ideas, which is beneficial to creation and harmless. The same is true for developing ideas, not a purely concrete process.There are often times when you have to give up in the end.The best way is to draw up multiple expansion methods at the same time, and finally choose one.This method, if I don't give an example, I'm afraid there will be some difficulties in understanding.When I was writing and writing, someone asked me such a question.If necessary, I will explain later.

One more thing to say is to take notes.The human mind is very lazy.A bad pen is worse than a good brain, and this also applies in the creative process.Writing out what you want to expand can promote thinking and thus improve efficiency. Q: In writing, ideas about traps pop up.What time period was it? Shimada: I really haven’t encountered the situation you mentioned, so don’t be embarrassed, I mean I haven’t encountered such a situation, but I heard that Uchida Yasuo-san often encounters it, and starts writing without any ideas.He'd write about a guy walking out the door and hearing a dog bark, and a car roaring in the yard, stuff like that.In this process, the idea of ​​the trap is naturally completed.Of course, I only heard about it and never asked him face to face.I remember hearing it on a talk show.

But I'm not like that. When it comes to traps, big or small, I think about them very carefully from the beginning.Eighty percent of the big traps are conceived before I start writing, from how they happen to how they unfold, I will think clearly. There is another question that has to be asked. If you feel that you are not confident enough to use the trap, or think that its scale is not enough, you must be prepared to fail.It is necessary to think clearly about what will happen in advance, so as not to affect the progress after thinking about it after starting to write. There are also people who like to start writing without thinking about anything. If I am not writing a book, I also like to use this method.However, I personally feel that it is dangerous to use this writing method to fail to maintain a consistent high level of creation.But if you want to write suspenseful light novels, you can still consider using this method.

Shimada: There is another important topic that needs to be mentioned.Some writers can continue to publish high-level works for ten or twenty years, and such people are considered geniuses or ghosts. This is not always the case, because talent alone is not enough. Why can you continue to produce good works for a long time?It's actually very simple, that is, they have made a reserve about traps and ideas-this is where the secret lies.It is this that makes them more creative than the average person. Why can so many ideas be stored?Because if you think of it, you won't forget it; why won't you forget it?Because I wrote it down.In other words, the idea is well preserved.This reserve work is well worth the time spent alone.

No matter what kind of genius, as long as he starts to write, no matter how good he can write, there will be a day when he will run out of ideas.Don't shy away from the fact that once in a while we have good ideas, but the odds of a truly workable idea appearing are very low, once in ten is considered good.Even if it is a genius or a ghost, it is useless to find a good idea.If you can't produce good works, you can only produce some bad works. In order to avoid this situation, it is very important to do some stockpiling beforehand.This refers not only to the setting of traps, but also to reserve some directional things such as unexpected plots.Prepare a notebook, add some sticky notes, and dedicate a separate time to this work.

If you develop the habit of saving, and then return to the process of writing a book, you can use the things in it to make writing easier.When you read these written down things after one or two years, you will have a feeling of becoming a reader, and your memory of your original creation will be blurred. Seeing these is like facing other people’s works. This allows for a more objective assessment.Regardless of whether these words look good or bad, they will always be helpful to you, and maybe they will generate better ideas based on them.It may also form a completely different work because of the stimulation of these ideas.

There are also some people who hold a view that "reserves are useless".There are some talented people who debuted for one or two years without making any reserves at all, and can still produce high-level works.It would be wrong to attribute all this to genius, the fact is that they have a certain reserve in their heads.For ordinary people, it is okay to hoard two or three ideas in their minds.A talented person may be able to save five or six ideas, and the quality is very high. No matter what kind of person it is, if the ideas are exhausted, the quality of the work will decline.It would be unrealistic to reimagine everything before starting to write.Prepare various ideas at the very beginning, and pay attention to accumulation at ordinary times.If you think about where to write, it will inevitably lead to low quality.

Q: What do you think of Mr. Seicho Matsumoto?Will he also stockpile? Shimada: I don't know the actual situation.But I heard that he doesn't write things down in his notebook.But I think that even if there is no notebook, there may be similar substitutes.If not, even he would not be able to continue writing for a long time.The focus of his records may not be on the idea of ​​the trap, the theme, the setting of motives, and social issues. I heard that what Mr. Qingzhang likes most is to listen to some interesting topics. Whenever such topics are mentioned, he will be very excited.Although the styles are different, everyone is the same on the issue of "thinking everything for the purpose of writing".I admire Mr. Qing Zhang very much, he has superhuman talent.Whether it is the initial work or the mid-term work, they are all very good, and I like each one very much.

Q: Mr. Shimada also takes notes, right?When it comes to the actual application stage, how can we make it come in handy? Shimada: I usually have the habit of taking notes.Most of my recent major works are the re-use of original stored materials.For example, "The Last Ball", "The Woman with the Umbrella", "The Child with Glowing Ears", and "The Satellite Orbit of the Imperial Capital" are all written in this way.Looking at it this way, I really benefited from the accumulation process.The difference is "Drowning Mermaid" and "Mermaid Weapon". These two works were not conceived until they were invited to write a collection of short stories. "The Adventure of Inubo Satomi" is also different. It was written when a new idea came into being at the beginning of the serialization.

Creativity is something that often comes to mind when nothing else is going on, and it is easy to be forgotten, so it is necessary to take notes.If you have a lot of work on your hands and your mind is racing, it's easier to forget it all at once.Therefore, accumulating ideas in writing is not a good choice.For example, I suddenly have a feeling for the word "astrology——", but it's hard to judge what its value is, so I just write it down first, and often turn it back later, it will give you unexpected surprises. reward.Of course, there are exceptions. Store all these ideas, and accumulate them, which will eventually become inexhaustible wealth for your life.Just like what I said before, if you forget about it and come back to it later, you can judge it more calmly.At the same time, it is also possible to generate new ideas in the process of reading these words.Of course, there is also the possibility of failure, and we must be mentally prepared in advance. Taking all this as a habit is the secret to maintaining the quality of creation for a long time; it is also a well-known secret among fiction writers.When doing ideation sheets, also set aside separate time.All excellent novelists can continue to produce good works in the years after their debut, because they have accumulated long before their debut.Therefore, it is wrong to say that "reserves are useless".It is a fantasy to remain among the ranks of first-line writers for more than ten or twenty years without making any reserves. Shimada: There is one more thing, which was asked by many people before, and it was also mentioned in your question just now.It's when I'm thinking about traps that I often draw pictures.It's weird that no one seems to do that.For example, if a dismembered corpse is drawn, it will have a different feeling from the idea in the mind.When I was writing The Inclined House Murder, I wanted to draw that house.This feeling has happened many times since then. This era is different from the era in which Eryeting Simi lived. This is our era.No, in fact, it has been like this since the time of Mr. Qing Zhang.When we write, we should show the scene of the idea in progress in front of our eyes like watching a movie, and then convert it into words and put it on paper.Of course, if you don't have this quality at the beginning, you have to practice more. When doing trap ideas, it's like watching a 3D movie.The description of the trap in language should be like a 3D image, and every detail can be seen.If the description is carried out hastily, it is inevitable that the details will be wrong.At this time, it is a good choice to draw it out, which will allow you to grasp it better.This method can actually be used to write other novels. I remember that I once heard a Toyota designer say that the styling of Japanese cars is made according to the three-sided drawing.That's why many Japanese cars look like boxes with four corners.A car will appear large if it has corners, whereas it will appear a bit small if it has rounded curves.This, on the contrary, caters to the preferences of the Japanese people.But if an Italian designer is allowed to do it, he will not be constrained by such a picture. Japanese technicians often divide it into small pieces after getting a three-sided picture, and then assemble it according to this picture.In fact, what needs to be disassembled is not the two-dimensional diagram, but the overall design diagram that needs to be deconstructed in the mind.When an idea appears, it cannot be restored to language, which is the same as this.If it is an Italian, the moment they see the picture, they will form an overall structure in their minds.So they can completely break away from the three-sided map.An Italian designer of sunglasses said this sentence - Japanese sunglasses are also made according to the three-sided map, just like the appearance of the Japanese, they are all flat, and the lenses are also drawn as if they were drawn with compasses. The Japanese face is indeed very flat.The nose is not high, and the cheeks are not protruding, so the sunglasses designed with the three-sided image can still be worn temporarily.The Italians are not. Their designs are more three-dimensional and will change with the curve of the face.This kind of design cannot be realized by three-sided graph.The same is true in the manufacture of automobiles. It is not a design at the level of the second dimension, but a design at the level of the third dimension. This also applies to trap design.If it is just a blindly two-dimensional way of thinking, it is inevitable that there will be mistakes.For example, in the secret room, you need to overlook the entire design from a three-dimensional angle and turn it over, so that you can see some places that are usually not noticed by people. At this time, it is a good choice to draw it.Of course, some people say that I can't draw, but I still recommend you try drawing, it's really useful. Q: Indeed, articles constructed with three-dimensional thinking are more real. Shimada: Yeah, very realistic. Q: I like Benge very much, and I also want to write such a book.However, writing in this case must also abide by certain rules, which are not allowed to be broken.If a work is written in disregard of the rules, it cannot be called a genuine work.Whenever I read the works of some famous classical detectives and see their god-like reasoning, it makes people feel happy physically and mentally.But is it a little bad to use the techniques used by the ancestors?Should we use it or not? Shimada: On this point, I agree with you.However, this problem, just take today's opportunity to analyze and analyze it.If you want to write Sherlock Holmes-style detective novels in Japan, there is no better way than imitation.But isn’t Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes also an imitation of Edgar Allan Poe’s Dupin?In this case, all detectives of this type, except Du Ping, are imitators.However, imitation must be bad? If imitating Dupin's Sherlock Holmes is acceptable, why can't the Japanese write it?Is it because the language environment is different?If you can't imitate because it's Japanese, what about French?What about German?What about Chinese? Language is also man-made, paper is also man-made, and writing utensils are also man-made. Aren’t these all imitations of ancestors? In fact, I feel that what is really influential is another element, which is rooted in the Japanese nation and extremely emotional.Living in a narrow room, a table full of pickles and miso soup, an old man who speaks boringly, an old lady who pretends to be well-mannered and full of lies—this is the Japanese, a group of people who have no independent opinions and cannot stand on their own at all.If such a person wants to write a novel, it will only be ridiculous.It is precisely this reason that caused the feeling you mentioned before. Newcomers do not have confidence in their writing ability, expressiveness, and line skills, and are intimidated.Before I started writing, I was hesitant about what kind of work I was writing and what style I was going to use, so that I couldn't start writing. The Western world is fundamentally different from Japan on many issues.If you use the same stage, the same time, the same era, the same language, and the same race to write your own works, the works written by the Japanese will always give people a sense of copycat.If this is because the environment described in the work is in Japan, then if the stage is changed to London and the people who appear on the stage are all written by British people, if this feeling of inferiority still persists, it can only be said that the problem lies in the The expressiveness and line skills have improved.In other words, skills are not as good as people. The same problem is also reflected in novels of other themes. This result is not only caused by education, but also some problems left over from history, such as the deprivation of the self-esteem of the entire Japanese nation and so on. Regarding the definition of Benge, my understanding is still different from others.In my opinion, enclosed spaces, secret rooms, famous detectives, and buildings with a classical style can all play a good role in setting off the work, but none of them must exist.These are not our first considerations. The most important element, as a character, is the "theory of reasoning."As long as it has excellent reasoning, then this book can be regarded as a qualified book.To put it to the extreme, famous detectives, foreign mansions, and secret rooms are actually unnecessary.Of course, I am not encouraging you not to write. These elements will still play a role in setting off the atmosphere of the whole work. Without it, it will inevitably make people feel boring.However, as long as there is good reasoning, I can assert that this is a good Benge novel. Therefore, even if the stage of the work is set in the Heian era, and the props are bullock carts, there is no problem.Besides, the word "Benge" was invented neither by the British nor by the Americans, but by the Japanese.So being obsessed with pursuing foreign countries is itself a very strange thing. It would not suffice to write another book if the theory were to be developed.What I want to say is, don't just stare at British style works.Please try to write some original works with a new Japanese style. Q: I heard that some writers’ traps are based on real events. Does Mr. Shimada have similar works? Shimada: "Akiyo Hideaki Incident" is a work like this.In fact, if you think about it carefully, I have quite a lot of works like this.In "Qiuhao Yingming Incident", I want everyone to understand the concept of unjust prison.The same goes for "The Ascension Man".In "Emperor Capital Satellite Orbit", the motivation part also refers to real events.Although in these works, it is not the setting of traps that draw on real events, but I should also have works of the kind you mentioned, but I just can’t remember them all at once. By the way, the inspiration actually came from a fraud case.I remembered again, "Jack the Ripper's One Hundred Years of Solitude", I wanted to write a novel based on an unsolved case in reality, and finally came up with this work. Q: I remember that Mr. Shimada once said that some of the mystery novels in this case can be developed into fantasy novels.Among the recently published Xinbenge works, which works can be classified into this category? Shimada: I'm really sorry, I really don't know.I'm already too busy just to create. Although I know I should read more works by newcomers, I really don't have time. Q: What kind of preparation do I need to do to write this kind of original work? Shimada: As I said before, writing an article should be like writing a poem. It is very important to have a poet's heart.There is also the ability to overlook the whole work and the composition of the article.The next step is theoretical thinking ability and argumentative writing ability.It is generally enough to have these, and it will be even better if you add better conversational skills. Of course, the core is the imagination of the idea.As I said before, if you want to cultivate this ability, you must pay attention to observation and look at everything from the perspective of writing.Through accumulation, if there is a suitable opportunity, a spark of inspiration will burst out.None of this can be accomplished overnight. Q: Are there any recommended works for reference? Shimada: Ray Bradbury's "October Country" is good, and some works of Edgar Allan Poe are also worthy of reference.In fact, you can also look at the works of masters such as Paul Delvaux, Dali, Max Ernst, and Andy Warhol.Fantasy is not always expressed in words. Regarding the writing of argumentative essays, it is enough to read works in the native language. It does not have to be works of natural reasoning, and some academic papers can also be used as a reference. Q: Mr. Shimada mentioned in "21st Century Benge" that "brain suspense" will become the mainstream in the future.Today, I wonder if you have a deeper interpretation of this point of view? Shimada: I still find it very interesting to think about the phrase “the brain is a conversion machine” in it.No matter what material is put in, it will spit out interesting transformations.Among these things, what is useful depends on your own judgment.These materials also include past works.People often think that the effect is more prominent when using works that already exist as a reference.But I would say that this reliance on past experience is dead wrong. The brain, like a blank sheet of paper, can accept all kinds of information between the universe.What the author has to do is to present this information in the works, and this process is like a "transformation".This nature itself has a strong charm. Q: If you use some knowledge that is usually difficult to understand, such as the latest science and technology, as a trap, it is difficult to foreshadow. If it is not done well, it will greatly reduce the reader's sense of involvement and surprise.What should we do? Shimada: It's really hard to say about such a problem without analyzing it based on specific problems.For example, a resident saw a visitor swiping his ID in the access control system, but he was knocked to death outside the door.Why didn't he enter the house?The reason for this question becomes a foreshadowing.In fact, credit cards can be used to cause system disorder to commit crimes. However, if you want to show the foreshadowing without explaining the operation principle of the access control system, the best way is to describe it with the help of other people's eyes.For example: "Someone saw it, and he was wandering at the door, as if he didn't have a key".In this way, it can not only not interrupt the overall sense of the work, but also lay the groundwork well. Q: Before Mr. Shimada's debut as a writer, is there any preparation work that must be done?Do you want to practice writing without interruption? Shimada: I didn't join a literary club when I was in school, I didn't have any experience in making doujinshi with my friends, and I didn't even keep a diary.So my friends think that it is incredible that I can become a writer. I just wrote some small reports in the sports newspapers, and wrote some random essays in my notebook.As far as writing exercises or something, I haven't done it.So, I didn't do any preparation at all. To say that it is helpful to me is something other than words.Such as painting, such as listening to music.I've also composed music myself, and I'm also very active in sports.Although I have written poetry, I have never done any preparation work. However, when I was in elementary school, I wrote detective novels.At that time, there was no reason to have confidence in myself.When I became a candidate for the Ranpo Award, the editor-in-chief of Kodansha also called me and asked me similar questions.I told him that I don't know why, but I feel that I can become a writer, and on this point, I firmly believe it. Forget it, I may be a special case, there is no reference value. Q: In order to become a novelist, is it necessary to try various life experiences? Shimada: Life experience—it’s hard to say.What life experience are you referring to?special experience?meaningful thing?Still a valuable experience?Or is it simply an experience that has value for writing? I think your question is "is it necessary to use materials to write a book?" My answer is that it is not necessary.Take fantasy novels as an example. Many people can write such novels very well even if they don’t go out to collect materials.Writing is not such a simple thing, there are no certain rules. Some people will say that American experiential novels cannot be written without the experience of living in the United States for a long time.I want to tell you, you don't have to take this kind of words to heart at all.Because there are people who can write well regardless of whether they have lived in the United States. This is talent. Having certain life experience will promote the writing of novels.However, counterexamples abound.Some people, even if they have a lot of life experience, can't write a novel. There is an argument that all novels are private novels. "Wouldn't you feel embarrassed to write a novel?" Such a question is based on the belief in the supremacy of private novels and modern naturalistic literature.This era is different from the era of Osamu Dazai. It is an era far away from war and poverty. Can such an era provide us with life experiences, and afford a completely private novel?Although I personally like Mr. Dazai's works very much, I feel that his dark and unethical life has not played any role in promoting his works. It is really valuable to think about reasoning without worrying about your own future or the bad nature of the Japanese.If you ask me what is the most valuable thing for Benge's creation, I will answer you, the accumulation of vision ability, sincere heart and flexible theoretical thinking.Don't think about superfluous things, just think about writing interesting works. "Let him go through the wind and rain, and I will stand firm" is the highest state of writing.

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