process and words

[jazzfish]

"To be a writer, you must write. And no amount of prep-work is writing. Research is not writing. Taking notes about the world is not writing. Thinking about writing is not writing. Only writing is writing."
--Gene Wolfe, May 2006

I've not really written much of anything in the last four years. Stuff from before that was all for class. So, I feel like I'm still discovering my process here. It's. . . very strange, and not terribly comfortable.

Cory Doctorow once mentioned that he writes the way people drive by their headlights: you can only see about fifteen feet in front of you, but you can make the whole trip that way. That sounds about right. I don't know what the next scene is going to be until I'm nearly done with this one. When I'm starting a scene I don't necessarily know where it's going. Occasionally I don't even know what the next sentence will bring.

What I'm finding about this thing I'm working on now (working title: "Junkyard Dog") is that I'm only writing maybe half to two-thirds of each scene, just sketching in the work it needs to do. It's littered with notes like DOG SCARES THEM OFF and SHE FIXES IT. This feels like cheating. More, it feels like I'm going to get to the end and have an entire manuscript full of half-written scenes that I need to complete and fix.

Of course, there's the fact that if I sit down and can't figure out what to do with the next scene I can go back and flesh out one of the previous ones, and maybe that'll get me unstuck. Still. It seems I don't so much need permission to write badly, as permission to write halfway.

---

I'm also working my way through Ursula Le Guin's Steering the Craft, as a way to get myself used to writing again. Some are fun, some are headache-inducing, all are useful. (She's sadly enamored with Strunk and White. Ah well.)

The first one, "write a piece meant to be read aloud," was a lot more fun than I'd thought it would be. It not only made me think hard about the sounds of words and phrases, it got me rolling them around in my mouth as I typed, just for the sheer enjoyment of the language.

This feels overly self-indulgent, like who would want to wade through an entire several thousand words of that? For me I'd think it would be exhausting pretty quickly, I'd get fed up. But. . . it does flow pretty well, and it's fun (though tiring) write. Leave it in the 'someday' file, I think.

Comments

[thanate.livejournal.com]

One of the big things that the NaNoWriMo people go on about is that you've got to allow yourself to skip bits. In general, I think, the intent is to come back to them (although at least in my case, if I don't want to write something "now" I am unlikely to want to do so later either) but the part that I keep rolling around in my head from time to time is the idea that if you're the one writing the story, why should you have to write the parts you don't want to? Restructure the story so you don't have to write them, instead.

Steering the Craft sounds interesting... is it up for borrowing when you're done playing with it?

[jazzfish]

My problem is that all the bits I'm not wanting to write right now are, well, the story. I seem to be trying to tell the story without all that pesky 'telling' bit. On the other hand, this is how I wrote papers in college too. Find the shape of it first, fill in the holes later.

Steering the Craft is definitely available to be loaned out! Will let you know when.

[diadelphous.livejournal.com]

It's littered with notes like DOG SCARES THEM OFF and SHE FIXES IT.

This is the story of my life. Well, my writing life anyway. I think it's a useful practice, especially since I find that 75% of the time the skipped scene gets cut completely. It's a way of editing while you write without realizing that you're editing.

I do know what you mean about it feeling like it's cheating, though. It makes the end of the draft feel nebulous, so you can't just say, "I'm finished! Woot!" Even though technically you are finished. If that makes sense.

[jazzfish]

I'm glad it's not just me, at least. Yeah. It's like, "I'm done! Only, not even close."

[nixve.livejournal.com]

Of course, there's the fact that if I sit down and can't figure out what to do with the next scene I can go back and flesh out one of the previous ones, and maybe that'll get me unstuck.

That's how I did my two NaNoWriMo novels and it actually works really well. Especially when you wake up one morning and go "omg! I know how the dog scares them off!" or something like that. It felt like it gave me the flexibility to help myself along while not getting bogged down. And it was fun to go back to the WRITE SOMETHING HERE's when I was stuck and fill them in.

[jazzfish]

Okay, cool. Will see how it works out, then.

[lilac-breeze.livejournal.com]

There's nothing wrong with having to discover your process. I still haven't really found mine, heh. Or maybe it's just changed a lot. Either way, at least you're writing, and that really is awesome.

I have a bunch of stories in my head, and none of them are complete. I have certain parts; certain snippets of dialog; I don't think it's cheating to take notes on that kind of thing. If you wait until you actually get to that part, you may have forgotten it, and then where would you be? That's happened to me before, and it makes me crazy.

[jazzfish]

*smile* Thanks. It's definitely a good thing.

This isn't so much taking notes, it's making the plot without doing much of the actual writing. Which worries me just a bit because it's the /writing/ that's hard, plot is easy. Or easier, anyway.