I decidedly agree with your afterthought that there's some correct balance of work and free time that makes one want to write. Let me add "stress" in there, too, because an overabundance of stress tends to make me want to curl up and mope instead of doing creative things. And let me also retroactively amend that it may not be "wanting to write", but "writing better". In hindsight I produced a shitton of words during the year I had entirely too much free time. It was simply that not very much of it was good, and that the words to free time ratio was poorer.
I also agree Tchaikovsky, and I had some friends back in the day who'd said a similar thing. You have inspiration sometimes, and when you do that's great. But most of the time you're going to have to work without it, and it's that "baseline" writing ability you need to improve, because inspiration is merely a gift when you can take it.
I'd also like to ask whether we're talking about how many words a writer spits out, or how many works they finish. I think it's a very different exercise to spit out a few errata and scenes that don't click and abandon it, than to persevere through the course of a work. (And it's the latter I have trouble with, whenever I start whining about writing. I suspect I've written 10k or more words this summer; they just aren't forming a coherent piece.)
Likewise one might ask what output really counts as output. We basically essay at each other every couple of days here in fandom, and I think much of it contributes to the kind of thought that does on some level improve creative writing ability. But it's not the same as putting something out.
I mean, no one looks at engineers and thinks they're naturally non-prolific. I guess some may be slower or more methodical than others, but most can produce reasonable products of their engineering on a fairly regular basis...
No, but I do think there's the cultural idea of the genius scientist who comes up with rad ideas out of nowhere, vs the one who slaves over data and memorizes stuff/crunches numbers.
Also "mawkish southern sentimentality" is basically the perfect phrase for To Kill a Mockingbird.
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Date: 2012-09-11 05:18 am (UTC)I decidedly agree with your afterthought that there's some correct balance of work and free time that makes one want to write. Let me add "stress" in there, too, because an overabundance of stress tends to make me want to curl up and mope instead of doing creative things. And let me also retroactively amend that it may not be "wanting to write", but "writing better". In hindsight I produced a shitton of words during the year I had entirely too much free time. It was simply that not very much of it was good, and that the words to free time ratio was poorer.
I also agree Tchaikovsky, and I had some friends back in the day who'd said a similar thing. You have inspiration sometimes, and when you do that's great. But most of the time you're going to have to work without it, and it's that "baseline" writing ability you need to improve, because inspiration is merely a gift when you can take it.
I'd also like to ask whether we're talking about how many words a writer spits out, or how many works they finish. I think it's a very different exercise to spit out a few errata and scenes that don't click and abandon it, than to persevere through the course of a work. (And it's the latter I have trouble with, whenever I start whining about writing. I suspect I've written 10k or more words this summer; they just aren't forming a coherent piece.)
Likewise one might ask what output really counts as output. We basically essay at each other every couple of days here in fandom, and I think much of it contributes to the kind of thought that does on some level improve creative writing ability. But it's not the same as putting something out.
I mean, no one looks at engineers and thinks they're naturally non-prolific. I guess some may be slower or more methodical than others, but most can produce reasonable products of their engineering on a fairly regular basis...
No, but I do think there's the cultural idea of the genius scientist who comes up with rad ideas out of nowhere, vs the one who slaves over data and memorizes stuff/crunches numbers.
Also "mawkish southern sentimentality" is basically the perfect phrase for To Kill a Mockingbird.