I have recently been writing a fair bit. Nothing new in that, no, but having spent much of 2009 sitting about thinking and reading for the most part, it's been interesting to spend so much of the first two months of this new decade slumped over a laptop, tapping away at the keys. And I have managed to produce a fair bit - 112,000 words by a pretty conservative estimate.
Most of this has been enforced by the alarming knowledge that in about six months' time (at the latest) I need to deliver an 80,000-word thesis to Loughborough University, and when I began 2010 I had probably just over a third of that word count. Now, thanks to diligent tapping at my laptop, I have well over two-thirds; and this means I can spend much of the next few months revising and rewriting what I have. This may sound like smug-faced laurel-resting, but actually the prospect of revision terrifies me almost as much. Doing a revision, as Isaac Asimov once remarked, is something like chewing used gum. The time and energy spent on reworking something you've already written could surely be better spent writing something new? That's far more exciting, and if you're blessed enough to have plenty of ideas, far easier, too.
I make no secret of this. Revising bores me. It's always bored me. It's necessary, but only up to a point. So, during the coming months I plan to spend plenty of time reading up on stuff and chasing up stray references for the thesis, but I also plan to write something new as well. I'm not sure what it'll be yet: fiction or non-fiction, article or note, story or novel, shopping list or blog. All suggestions are welcome - on the back of a matchbox or, failing that, in comment form at the bottom of this little blog.
Interesting point, Oliver. I tend to fin that redrafting can be liberating but only if I'm doing a rewrite that is pretty much writing again from scratch. But then I come from a different background, tending towards poetry rather than prose. :)
ReplyDeleteThanks, Anon. I tend to find that poetry is the hardest form to revise, though it can be the most satisfying. It's really revisions to novels that bore me. 2009 was the last year for four years that I didn't write a novel, so I may write one this year. It's finding the time; but if I tell myself that I'll not spend overlong rewriting it, it'll be an incentive to sit down and get it done.
ReplyDeleteHow about some sonnets? :)
ReplyDeleteSonnets? Hmm... Now that's a good idea. I have a few rough ideas for sonnets, I'm just waiting for them to develop and percolate. Writing poetry is hard (but worth it :))
ReplyDelete"I have rewritten - often several times - every word I have ever written. My pencils outlast their erasers." - Vladimir Nabokov
ReplyDeleteI penned my proposal for you on the back of a matchbox as suggested. Unfortunately you can not see it from where you are at. Perhaps a story is in order?
ReplyDeleteBlast, that's the sort of thing I forgot to consider when I made the matchbox suggestion. So thanks for backing up your proposal electronically. I think a story would be just the ticket, and have a few ideas sloshing round. Maybe some sort of dystopian tale? I'll get thinking...
ReplyDelete