I’ve just begun a new writing project. The idea came from a poem I read a few years ago, and it grew as I wrote about it. It became exciting.
However, going from the work I did on my first novel–working on it for six years–to starting fresh has been a little shocking. I expected to just dive into the work and see it grow. But as I’ve worked on it, I’ve found it to be thin. I’ve found myself questioning it from different angles. This is very different work from revising copy. It has been enough of a struggle to cause me to question it. Some of the questions emerge in the voices of writing friends.
The whole thing has got me thinking again about my writing process. As I told someone last night, my process is usually to simply start writing. That is my way in. I begin with lying and making things up as I go. Then I decide that I like the start and go with it. I admit that I was probably influenced by those Hollywood depictions of the writer sitting in front of a typewriter and beginning with “Chapter One,” and then the scene cuts to the last line typed and the words, “The End,” with the writer ripping the paper from the typewriter and handing it off to instant readers. This is dramatic, romantic, and story-bookish, and it skips the real work that goes into writing. It skips the planning that happens before typing the words “Chapter One.” It skips the reflection and analysis. It skips the way that stories actually emerge, usually from repeated revisions.
And then I am standing in a place I have never been before, in the shadow of my first novel. It doesn’t tower, but it does stand there. I’ve read about the struggles of writing a second novel. Friends have asked if I am writing a sequel. That seems to be the way many get around this new tension. But I find myself wanting to write something new, and then the writing doesn’t quite come.
Again, I go back to process. Some writers are planners. They gather all sorts of ideas about character, plot, setting. They research aspects of their story line. Before they write a word of a draft, they have the entire structure outlined.
I don’t work that way. I start with scratch outlines and general ideas, and with character. I’ve tried to do some outlining–it is all pretty spacial and roundabout. I have noticed that when I write one scene, another one appears that I can move to. But the story meanders, and coming off that first novel that is finished, I know that it is meandering and I don’t like it.
The struggle is just to allow it to wander around and discover new things.
My writing process is one that I like to think is fluid. I like to plan, but I also like to discover. My friend said that he and his wife planned their vacation. They read up on places in the area they were going to visit, so they knew where and when they were going to be and what they could expect their young children to see. And then they went, and things happened that were pleasant surprises. For example, they came upon a flock of pheasant in one place, and it turned into an exciting time for their kids.
That’s what I hope for with my writing. I want to plan it, to know where I am going to be and when. But I also want those plans to lead to a discovery of pheasants.
Tom, I appreciate your distinction between THE writing process and MY writing process. Yes, it’s fluid, but I would add yet another caveat. I find, from one book to another, from one chapter to another, that MY writing process should be plural–my writing processES. What works on one work won’t on another. Maybe the key word for a good writer is pragmatism. Find what works, and work it.
Thanks, Tim. Exactly. Even my own writing process varies from project to project. And the need to be pragmatic–and especially to be willing to change when certain new difficulties arise–is the one constant to it. I will add, however, that another constant in my own process is that I know that I start out the same way every time–with little initial invention and a lot of exploratory writing. That seems to be constant from project to project–until now. I’m now finding I need o alter some aspects of it. We’ll see. Thanks for your post.
On some of my projects, I begin with the first line. That sets up the tone and thesis, and then I research to flesh it out. On another book, A Passionate Pursuit of God, I began with researching every verse in the Bible that dealt with knowing God, let them percolate, and then came the organizing and then the writing. I think that’s my favorite part of writing–letting each project be itself, a bit like God and us perhaps?
I look forward to hearing what this new writing project is. Hope you have a productive summer!
Thank you, Joseph.