A little while ago–most likely in my article “The Onus of Creativity,” I made reference to the age-old question of where writers get their inspiration from. Or what specifically is the nature of the energy that powers a creator to make a work of any kind, and can you actually sense that energy?
I believe you can sense that energy behind someone’s act of creation. As to where I get my inspiration from and what the nature of that energy is for me, the answer is really one and the same. In X-Men: First Class, Professor Xavier is attempting to guide Magneto into–not only to using but–mastering his powers. He tells Magneto to envision moments of greatest joy and the most horrendous pain. By combining these feelings, by drawing from the well of passion and clarity that they both come from, Magneto is able–for the first time in his life–to consciously and concisely access the full range of his powers.
The point is: the place that Magneto draws from is love and hate; joy and sadness; serenity and power. One of my Creative Writing teachers once said to us that when we write, we should always write from a place of calm and detachment but–while I agree with a lot of that in principle–that is just not how humanity nature, or its art works: at least not in their entirety.
One way you can look at it if you’d like is that emotion and sentiment–even interest–begins the impetus for, and the creation of structure and clarity. Viewing emotions in a calmer retrospect has its advantages. Yet art is also about expressing yourself: even with violent splashes of paint across a canvass. I believe that there is that “knife’s edge,” that X-Men: First Class, among other creative places makes reference to: that tenuous ground between elements and emotions that is a whole other mindset in itself.
It is also not a precise science. Sometimes you feel more than you think, or you are more sad than angry, or more angry than happy. There are different mixtures of all emotions, impulses and thoughts: known more kindly, again, as human nature. People always tell you when you feel conflicted to “express it” or to even “write it down.” Sometimes the process is calming, other times cathartic, removed, continuous and nagging, and whole other kinds of varieties thereof. And that knife’s edge can slip from one direction to another: or even become a sundial whose shadow is determined by the outer world and the place you choose to find yourself situated on.
But whatever it is, it is unique and not the ultimate thing. Those energies will always be there by virtue of what you are as a person, but it is the vessel that matters more. It is the thing to maintain and focus so that you can use those energies to make whatever you want or need. That vessel, of course, is you and it is a task that is easier said than done.
It is easier said, but it is necessary.
Mythic Bios 
You write really beautifully. I came across a link to your review of The Glass Bead Game when I was writing about my own experiences of Hesse (I use Zemanta). I think you’d love one of his earlier works, Narziss and Goldmann, which goes into precisely the artistic issues you mention here.