The curse of writer's block

Following poet laureate Andrew Motion's complaints that he has been struggling to write new verse, in The Independent, John Walsh considers the curse of writer's block.

...when creative blockage sets in, the blank page before you grows to the size of a tablecloth. The grey laptop screen seems to hum with malignity. You feel you have nothing of interest or amusement to impart to the world. Words refuse to shift – as they always have done hitherto – from the vast lexicon in your memory to the sentences half-forming in your brain.