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Author Topic: dreams as a source for story ideas
Corky
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This topic is for weird dreams that might be of use as story triggers for someone.
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Corky
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I'll start.

The other morning I was dreaming that I was trying to get snow off of the branches of those short evergreen bushes that they plant around houses for landscaping. I was brushing the snow off of some random bushes somewhere and into a bowl when a police car pulled up behind me.

So I started trying to pick any needles or little sprigs from the bushes that had fallen into the bowl with the snow, so the police officer couldn't say I had damaged the bushes at all.

Then my alarm went off.


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Meredith
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This is an interesting topic. My most current novel, BLOOD WILL TELL, actually started as a weird dream. Of course, I had to let it ferment a while before it actually became a novel. And several things changed in that process. But that's where it started.
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Corky
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Cool, Meredith. Maybe we could expand this topic to include a "from dream to story" process. I'd certainly be interested in examining how that happens.

Or maybe that should be a discussion in the Open Discussions on Writing forum.

If you're interested in talking about it, I can start at topic there for that, or you can talk about it here.


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Lyrajean
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My current WIP progress started as a dream. Taht particualr scene the one I dreamed and ahd to come up with a way to explain is long gone from this version of the story as is the then main charcter but the idea remains.

This would be an interesting topic for discussion.


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Corky
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Okay. I'll start one on turning dreams into stories in Open Discussions on Writing, and we can keep this one just for weird dreams.
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Architectus
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Quick version.

I was trying to get away from this hotel or apartments, I can't recall. These pods hit the earth. I wasn't sure where they came from. These long stringy worm like things, more like wires, oozed out of them and got inside of people.

The wire-like things changed the person from the inside out. One of the strings was borrowing its way into my arm, but I managed to rip it out.

Freaky dream.

[This message has been edited by Architectus (edited September 24, 2009).]


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Robert Nowall
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How about the "wallowing in filth" dream---you, and everything around you, is covered with [CENSORED] and you can't get clean. I get them all the time---usually I'm dreaming I'm in a public restroom.
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Crank
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Many years ago, a dream found me in the back yard of a place I rented when I first moved to Virginia. I had a good sized back yard, a field, and a stretch of woods that was home to quite a variety of wildlife.

While I was in the back yard with the Golden retriever I owned at the time, a deer walked out of the woods and came right up to us. On his hind legs. In my dream, I knew that the deer was a friend of mine. He told me that construction and overpopulation was forcing him to leave the northern Virginia area in favor of the mountains, so he wanted to say his good byes before he started his trek. Then, he handed me a camera, and asked if the retriever would take a picture of the two of us together. He and I put an arm (?) around each other's shoulders, and my dog snapped the picture.

I woke up laughing.

BTW...for me, that's considered a normal dream.

While converting what I saw from dream to story, I mistakenly siphoned out much of the experience's surrealism and turned it into explainable science, so it's quite a bit different (and darker) than I originally intended. Regardless..."Trophic Decrescendo" still stands as an enjoyable writing experience.

S!
S!


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Marita Ann
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Oh, if you want weird dreams, I am the person to ask. I try not to be one of those weird people who tells everyone about their dreams all the time, but I didn't start this topic, soooo...

One of my favorite ones happened this summer after watching "A Very Potter Musical" on YouTube, which I generally recommend if you haven't seen it.

I was going to spy on Voldemort and his Death Eaters one evening when they were all having dinner together. I had taken a Polyjuice potion and turned myself into Malfoy, and I was also using an invisibility cloak. I went into the room where they were eating and sat down at a table in the back. Someone had put a plate in front of me, and so, naturally, I started eating. Just as I was realizing that someone might notice a fork moving up and down and food disappearing into thin air, Voldemort spotted me. He came over to my table, grinning evilly. The Death Eaters gathered around.

Two of the Death Eaters, both men, then started singing (this dream was triggered by a musical, after all) about how, if you got a tattoo that said something about yourself, whatever you said in the tattoo would come true. I think one of the men had gotten a tattoo that said he could turn into an animal or something. This gave Voldemort the idea to put a tattoo on the top of my foot stating that he was the ruler of the world. But I, thinking quickly, asked if it could say that he was the greatest ruler in the world, because then, by definition of "greatest," it would turn him into a leader who was good, and therefore eliminate his evil-ness!

I woke up pretty proud of myself.

[This message has been edited by Marita Ann (edited September 25, 2009).]


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Lyrajean
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I had a recurring dream when I was young about walking through the traffic at the most busy intersection in town wearing nothing but a giant chinese candy wrapper. a see-throuh one BTW.

I guess this is a variant of the 'being naked in a public place' dream.

One of my elementary school classmates had opened up a baseball to see what was inside (in real life) and the core was made of tightly wrapped chinese candy wrappers, go figure... guess that's where this dream came from.


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