Michael Moorcock is among the most prolific and influential British science fiction and fantasy writers of all time. He doesn’t seem to ever get stuck for inspiration.

But when Moorcock needs ideas or advice on how to tell a story, he goes to the greats:

Find an author you admire (mine was Conrad) and copy their plots and characters in order to tell your own story, just as people learn to draw and paint by copying the masters…

No shame.

In Angela Carter’s introduction to the writing guide Death is No Obstacle, she mock-accuses genre-spanning fantasist Michael Moorcock of “giving everything away.” This may be taking it too far, because it’s hard to see how many writers even if they follow his advice to a tee could churn out novels in under a week as he famously did.

Most of Moorcock’s lessons to writers for writing with economy and speed was planning ahead. Among those was stockpiling ideas for future use so you don’t get stuck for inspiration along the way.

Here’s one:

You need a list of images that are purely fantastic: deliberate paradoxes, say: the City of Screaming Statues, things like that. You just write a list of them so you’ve got them there when you need them. Again, they have to cohere, have the right resonances, one with the other…

Try listing five or ten of those right now. File them away. Use as needed.