I don't reckon it's all-out sucky every time. I've had some bad collaborative experiences, but I've had some good ones too.
You never know which way it's going to go. You might not work at all well with the collaborator, but I think it's worth the risk to find out, because sometimes it can work really well.
Really well experience: I gave a bunch of my poems to some comic artist friends and they came up with some brilliant interpretations.
Really bad experience: I was working with a web designer on an interactive writing piece for the local State Library last year, and it was a nightmare, mainly because the web designer never listened to anything I said and always went off and did her own thing, which was really ugly hypertext fiction website stuff. ugh.
I think if you're talking about the two of you writing together, maybe it's harder to find the flow, but even in those circumstances it can be good. I and a friend have cowritten comic scripts and radio play scripts, and the process has been a lot of fun and I think what we came up with was pretty good, too.
I'd say take a punt, and if you're not happy, you can always get out. Plus there's that whole thing of being exposed to other ways of working that may not sit side-by-side at the time, but you can always take what you've learned and seen and use it in other places.
I wonder if any of that is relevant at all.
m. |
