To quote a cliche: the more things change, the more they stay the same. All great stories have similarities. Panday is a fantasy epic of a blacksmith fighting against supernatural enemies, while the Harry Potter series is a bildungsroman.

Thanks to my devoutly Catholic parents, I’m pretty familiar with the Bible. Many protagonists of the so-called best selling book of all time have battled against extraordinary foes (unless you consider Satan and his evil minions normal). And the brief glimpses of Jesus’ youth could be interpreted as a coming-of-age story.

But it would be foolish to ignore other religious texts. I’m not that familiar with the Koran, the Vedas, the Five Classics, etc., but I’m sure they also contain memorable narratives. After all, there must be a reason why so many people consider them important.

And what about the classics? What about Beowulf, Dante’s trilogy, the Iliad, and our own Filipino epics? Fellow Filipinos, do you remember Biag ni Lam-ang (the Life of Lam-ang)? How can you forget the prodigious child who could move, speak, and think like an adult, mere moments after leaving his mother’s womb?

The way I see it, literary creativity usually involves the specifics and presentation, rather than the plot’s progression and development. Since most writers read a lot, it’s probable that their ideas were influenced by something they’ve read before.

So, instead of trying to come up with something new, you should check out the wide body of literature at our disposal (*cough* Internet! *cough*). Chances are, someone else already came up with it. After all, a great way to develop your writing, or any other skill for that matter, is to build your fundamentals and copy the greats.