Steal the Caffeine, Leave the Coffee

        In my last post, I talked about plagiarism and the idea of incorporating the things that inspire you into your work without stealing them from the original creator, and making something new that you can rightfully be proud of yourself. In looking for a good metaphor to describe this process, the thing that came to mind was taking the caffiene out of a cup of coffee, while leaving the coffee in the cup. Take the substance and leave the style. Try to figure out what was at work in a scene that made you love it and figure out how to apply that knowledge to your writing.

       Lets look at one of the definitive portrayals of envy in film. Then we'll break it down and see what we can use.  The film is Amadeus and the character we're looking at is Salieri, an accomplished composer in his own right who had the misfortune of living in Austria in the time of Mozart.

          There's an incredibly complex mixture of emotions here. There's genuine awe and admiration for Mozart's work. It is both agony and ecstasy for him.  To experience something so exquisite that surely it must be the hand of God on earth and to know that he can't do it. He's just talented enough to recognize true talent when he sees it.  I look at Salieri and I'm reminded of what we hear about the stages of grief.  Throughout the movie we see them all Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, even Acceptance to a degree. Everything that he ever created just became worthless in his eyes, all the accolades turned to ash in his mouth, the praise of his peers a cruel joke.  Nothing he ever does will be as good as what he just saw and he knows it.  His whole life to this point wasted. It's tearing him apart, because he loves music. He worked all his life to master its discipline and this little shit just had it given to him.  It's like seeing the girl you love, the sweet, beautiful, amazing future mother of your children marry a complete douchebag instead of you. And he ask himself. Why not me? Why, if you were giving out amazing inspiration and natural ability couldn't you give it to me God? Why him and not me? He doesn't deserve it and I do. How could you do this to me?

         This was a story about a composer swallowed by Mozart's shadow. But the feelings here could belong to anybody who came up second best in a story. You could be writing a story about an Olympic silver medalist or an actor who used to be on a show with someone who's career exploded into Blockbusters and Oscars. You don't have to copy the structure or the dialogue of the scene to make it work for you. Just tap into the power of it. Steal the caffeine, leave the coffee.