What is it that motivates you to write? What is your process?
I write in several ways. If it is an assignment or project that I'm not particularly excited about, I still just dive in and try to give it my best, though I may procrastinate for a bit. I have strong opinions about a lot of things and love to create with my words, so I am seldom stuck for ideas. When I do run up against a wall, I walk away from the piece for awhile and get a different perspective. Then I come back to tackle it afresh.
A lot of my best ideas come as flashes of inspiration. If I don't get it down then and there, or at least the core ideas, the flashes often fade. That's why I keep journals and am the post-it note queen. I also write ideas down on napkins and checks or whatever is handy.
I think sometimes people stumble along in writing because they do not have a basic grasp of grammar and punctuation or perhaps even an adequate vocabulary. I read grammar books for fun. Obsessive, I know. So that aspect of writing does not slow me down. The hardest time I have, however, is with the re-write.
When I complete a piece and I feel happy with my product, it is hard to look at it dispassionately and start slicing. Even if I make radical nixing (like just automatically dump the first 3 pages) as some suggest, I have a hard time not keeping those pages in a drawer. It is rather like those cultures who feel like you have captured their souls when you take their pictures. That is kind of how I feel about some of my writing. If I sincerely put myself into those pages, I just can't pretend they never happened. They are in some way a part of me. Sick, right? The same is true of songs. They end up in a file or in a drawer, waiting to be reworked and re-born.
My kids are going to have so much fun sorting through the detritus of my life!
So what motivates you to write? What is your process? How do you re-write? Is it painful?
I just write - don't plan much out, just let it flow. Then I edit.
ReplyDeleteEditing is what I love doing - I'm not fond of the initial write. I love coming up with a better way of saying something, a clever turn of phrase, a new word I don't normally use - something just a bit out there.
Detritus is a good word, but then so were flotsam and jetsam. Yes just what will our children do with all our 'stuff'. I'm seeing a dumpster parked out front.
They will have a dumpster and a delete button!
ReplyDeleteSo what happens to the ideas you get on the run or in the middle of the night. How do you trap them?
I would say that more than 99% of my writing comes from "flashes of inspiration." The other 1% are things that I wrote for money (which I have not done very often) and was assigned the work rather than coming up with the topic on my own...I just don't do good without inspiration, and in those 1% cases I usually do it right before deadline - which I guess shows that the deadline is a forced inspiration which substitutes for a natural one.
ReplyDeleteOne other thing: Although I am not obsessive about grammar because some of the rules strike me as confining, I AM obsessive about vocabulary. I prefer to use a variety of words instead of recycling the same handful over and over, but I do not know if I pull it off more often than not.
Homeschooling my kids and then again seeing how they operated in college, it drove me crazy how my kids would leave their work till right before the deadline, pull an all nighter, and then do well! It was the do well thing that irked! :-) But I think you're right: The deadline becomes its own motivation and stimulation!
ReplyDeleteI want to write the next big grammar book. I am into functional grammar that helps the reader track. I hate reading books that are into this abscence of commas jazz (really just to save a buck in ink)that cause you to stumble and re-read. Pet peeve!
Thanks for your input!
I am not a writer but I do have the gift of enjoying reading! Reading has enriched my life over the years. What rich gifts God has gifted us with.
ReplyDeleteI am a reader, too! And that is why it is a bit discouraging that in some quarters good writing skill is minimized.
ReplyDeleteI was reading a health food / diet book that had so many errors in grammar and punctuation, let alone plain old typos, that I put it down and never picked it up again!
So . . . when I write my book you can be my first customer! :-)
I like to jump right in...and then edit heavily. :)
ReplyDeleteJumping followed by editing is allowed! :-)
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ReplyDelete