Writing on with a little advice from the greats.
Writing is like sex. The more you think about it, the harder it is to do. It’s better not to think about it so much and just let it happen.” – Stephen King.
Talking about the inadequacies of character development in my last post did help, but in the end, the trick to writing again, is well, writing again. I just needed to write and get some damn words down. And finally, after about three weeks or virtually no words – scary I know – I wrote about a thousand words last night toward ‘the abattoir short.’ It seems this is a very important story to me and part of the reason for my slump was probably pressure. There’s the temptation to go back and rewrite, to start over, but then I would continually start over and over and over. So, then I look to the words of Steinbeck to keep me going:
Write freely and as rapidly as possible and throw the whole thing on paper. Never correct or rewrite until the whole thing is down. Rewrite in process is usually found to be an excuse for not going on.
Thanks to JoiseyGirl of Thought Bubbles for plugging me this week. She even made this cool, blurby graphic thing. She’s sending me some hits, so head over there and return to favour.
Good advice – just keep writing. I have to tell myself that at times when I get too caught up ina chapter and I find myself getting stuck rather than moving forward.
Side note: The Novel Word count bar you have on the side, is there a place to create those? (or the code for it)
If you click the Fighting for Peace counter, it goes to the site that generates the code.
I still think that Stephen King’s On Writing is one of the best books out there. He is often overlooked because he is a horror writer and that is a shame.
I’m reading ‘On Writing’ at the moment. I’ve reread it countless times and think it’s the best book on writing there is.
I’ve probably read it at least 5 times. It’s inpirational and makes me want to get off my butt and write. Another good one is “How to Write Science Fiction and Fantasy” by Orson Scott Card.
As I’ve said before, your genre is not my favorite, but I am fascinated by getting a peek inside the head of a real writer and seeing the process as it unfolds.
My writing has, for the most part, been connected with college assignments, but I always found I did better when I just wrote and wrote, without editing, just to get it down. If I tried to polish as I went, I usually got stuck along the way. I think that’s what you’re saying, too.
BV
Wonderfully corect quote. But what I think is about publishing (and not writing). I would read like that: Just done think about it (sex), do it (I mean publish). LOL