(no subject)

[tencrush]

In honour of NaNoWriMo, I am going to experiment for a month with NOT WRITING A NOVEL, because that's probably far better for everyone concerned. What I will be doing, is experimenting with going FRIENDS ONLY on this journal. I get a lot of anonymous comments, I know, and I'm sorry for all of you anons, I'd rather keep everything open, but frankly, I can't be fucking bothered anymore.

If you've friended me and I've friended you back but I actually haven't ever heard from you since in the form of comments on this journal, I'm cutting you off, I've had enough of lurkers as well.

As you were.

Comments

[cirrocumulus.livejournal.com]

UNPOPULAR OPINION TIEM:

Personally, I've never thought that NaNoWriMo was that fantastic an idea in the first place. I'm sure it inspires a lot of good writers who have been sitting on good novel ideas to actually sit down and write it, but form what I've seen it mostly just inspires a lot of craptastic writers who really shouldn't be writing anything to write that truly dreadful novel they've been thinking about. It just seems to me like if you were really serious about writing a novel you would have already done so instead of waiting for this internet-organized occasion; plus, I find the word and time limit silly.

...But that's just me being a dickhead.

[alba17.livejournal.com]

I thought it was a weird idea too. The mere production of 50,000 words in a month seems a little meaningless and not a guarantee of quality. I guess people are mainly doing it for the personal challenge.

[kalliopeia.livejournal.com]

The idea is to free yourself from that bitchy little self-editor that insists that every single word be perfect before you move on to the next one. The word count is pretty arbitrary, I think, but the time limit makes you set aside perfectionism and just get the thing down, because there's no other way you're going to get 50,000 words written in thirty days. It's actually pretty useful if you can do it, as it gives you a real sense of accomplishment and maybe even something to work with as the basis for something that might really be publishable someday.

The idea is not to barf up a 50,000 word novel and pop it into the mail to some poor unsuspecting slush pile reader on Dec 1st, though I'm sure lots of people do that.

[cirrocumulus.livejournal.com]

I suppose I get that idea of trying to free your creativity, but maybe I just disagree with it because that's not how I work at all. It usually takes me about an hour to write 500 words because I do sit there at my computer spending several minutes trying to figure out how to phrase the idea I'm trying to express, and though I suppose there is merit in freeing yourself of that self-editing, but when I write I usually feel like the perfect phrase I'm searching for is there, I just need to take the time to stitch it together and I'm not willing to just plow ahead and throw anything down to meet a time limit. You can always go back and edit but you might still miss that perfect phrase you're looking for because you're not really in the creative moment anymore.