Entries Tagged as 'writing tips'

Fitzgerald on creating characters

July 19, 2010

“Start out with an individual and you find that you have created a type — start out with a type and you find that you have created nothing.” — F. Scott Fitzgerald

Categories: Writing
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Writing Is Play

April 13, 2010

“The opposite of play is not work, it’s depression,” says Dr. Stuart Brown in this TED presentation on the importance of play. (The quote seems to originate with Brian Sutton-Smith.) I ran across this epigram yesterday in a blog post by Garr Reynolds called “The Secret to Great Work Is Great Play,” and a light [...]

Categories: Writing
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The Anxiety of Finishing

January 31, 2010

It may be difficult for non-writers to understand why, as my last post suggested, writers become anxious as the end of a project approaches. You would think, after staring at a manuscript for months, even years, any sane writer would be relieved finally to be done with it. David Remnick described the anxiety of finishing [...]

Categories: Creative Process · Writing
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The Importance of Shipping

January 28, 2010

Seth Godin advises writers and other artists (at around 7:45 of this video), “What you do for a living is not be creative. Everyone is creative. What you do for a living is ship. … That is the discipline of what a creative artist does.” Even allowing for a little hyperbole (obviously artists have to be [...]

Categories: Creative Process · Productivity · Writing
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“Productivity Stems From Passion”

November 6, 2009

A poster by graphic designer Frank Chimero. Writers (and other creatives), take note.

Categories: Creative Process · Productivity · Writing
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A cabin made of hours

September 21, 2009

“Like so many of the key skills of the writer’s life, the solution [to being distracted by the Internet] comes down to (groan) self-discipline. I came back resolved to break my habit of checking email and the Web (even to handle essential, chore-like tasks) whenever the urge strikes. I’ve converted to the ‘no email before [...]

Categories: Creative Process · Internet · Productivity · Writing
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1,000 Words a Day

September 17, 2009

I have a new work routine. Mornings, I go into the city to write in the main reading room of the Boston Public Library, where I churn out a thousand words a day on my new novel. The BPL has wireless internet access, so I don’t bring a laptop. Too much distraction. Instead I type [...]

Categories: Creative Process · Productivity · Writing
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Why authors should (and shouldn’t) blog

August 21, 2009

I began this blog for a purely mercenary reason: to sell more books. But I discovered to my surprise that I enjoy doing it. Good thing, too, because after three months at it I seriously doubt this blog will ever be an effective sales tool. Of course, the logic behind author blogs is unimpeachable. The [...]

Categories: Blogging · Writing
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Remembering Updike the Father

August 10, 2009

John Updike’s son David, also a writer, has a lovely piece in the Times’ Paper Cuts blog. It is a eulogy for his father which he delivered at a tribute in March at the New York Public Library. I found this passage particularly touching: But for someone who was getting famous, my father didn’t seem [...]

Categories: Writers · Writing
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Crime novels and entertainments

August 8, 2009

I was interested to read on Sarah’s blog about the fuss John Banville raised recently. Banville said, undiplomatically, that he writes more quickly and easily as crime writer “Benjamin Black” than he does writing literary novels under his own name. There were hurt feelings, suggestions that Banville was “slumming,” and the author felt compelled to [...]

Categories: Books · Writers
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