Writers and Play

[sartorias]

I played with dolls until I was twelve, at which time the 'rents began to think it was a tad weird, and the dolls had vanished when I came home from summer camp. I didn't see until years later that I was working out elaborate novel plots with those long games that involved our entire bedroom. (All the cardboard castles and stuff I also laboriously

Comments

[anna_wing]

I played with a farm set - lots of little plastic animals, pigs, cows, ducks, a pond, walls that slotted together, trees. Just setting everything up and arranging it was joy enough (it is significant, I think , that the only video game that I ever truly enjoyed was Sim City). I felt no particular need for stories, just for a scenario.

I actively enjoy reading happy fluff where nothing too dramatic happens in an agreeable, intelligent and amusing way. There is enough misery, stupidity and melodrama in the real world.

[sartorias]

Oh, yes, on the fluff. Wodehouse is on my bedside shelf.

[breathingbooks]

I played with dolls until late too, like you mainly (I liked historical fashion too) for story purposes, in particular being able to act out countless minor variations on plots. I didn't like doing it with others much at any point though - it was all very interior and shifting for me, and the point was the plot structure, not any spontaneity.

[sartorias]

That's interesting! I guess I liked it both ways.

[breathingbooks]

Heh, I read about kids doing imaginative group stuff in books, but I was a very individualistic child and liked games where the other kids were friendly competitors or doing their own separate creations. (Valancy with her small sand castle resonated *g*.)

[sartorias]

Makes total sense!

[serialbabbler]

I fed the only Barbie doll anybody ever gave me to the dog... after spending about an hour bending the legs back and forth because the knee could bend the wrong way and that was so weird. Probably not the sign of a budding writer, that.

On the other hand, I loved making dioramas with horse chestnuts and black locust seeds as the "people".

No idea what I would've done if I'd been saddled with a normal family. *laugh*

[sartorias]

Dioramas! How I adored those!

[tcastleb]

I had invisible animal friends...most notably dalmations because I wanted a dog and never got one. Had plenty of toys--a couple GI Joe, several He-Man and She-Ra, My Little Ponies, Playmobil people and animals. Never liked Barbies. I had a dollhouse and lots of little plastic animals I loved to play with, though most of the scenarios involved them being hurt or sick (and that frequently shows up in the fiction, sigh.)

Around sixth grade Star Trek: the Next Generation was in about season 4, action figures started coming out (I got most of them) and I had a group of friends who'd play Star Trek with me. My first serious writing venture was ST:TNG/DS9 fanfic.

I still have my bag of plastic animals and all my Star Trek figures. The rest are gone.

[sartorias]

My son's bio dad came over once when son was small, and brought a bag of toys, including Star Wars toys from '77-79. Son played with those until most vanished, and I wondered if their styles of play were the same. (You know, genetic factors.) Son's games would go on for days, using the entire living room as a setting. I suspect that some games went outside, which is how his "guys" vanished, because I never touched his games. (That and puppy chew accidents!)