› ›
Welcome to Writers Talkback. If you are a new user, your account will have to be approved manually to prevent spam. Please bear with us in the meantime

A thought from Andrew McCall Smith....

lexialexia
edited March 2009 in - Reading
Alexander McCall Smith, professor of Medical Law at University of Edinburgh, author of over sixty books, fiction and specialist titles (in his own words -he has stopped counting ! )

In discussion with Andrew Marr today , he says that if as a writer you start to think too deeply about what you are writing, you lose the spontaneity and some of the potential of immediate thoughts. (my paraphrasing)

I agree - mainly because that is how I write - from the inmmediacy of my thinking. Not that this is necessarily right/wrong, good or bad.

What do you think ? (I assume of course we are not meaning editing here, just initial drafts)

Comments

  • BillBill
    True. It rang a bell for me. I think to much. I think.
  • ClaudiaClaudia
    Yes, this is interesting. I think my best stuff comes when my first draft is written quickly and spontaneously. However, I usually find it very hard not to edit as I write! I try to overcome this by pretending I'm not writing an article, but writing a 'story' for my friends. My writing is much more natural when I do it like that.
  • DwightDwight
    There has to be SOME thinking though; otherwise you wouldn't know where your story is going or what you want to achieve in this scene. Lexia, I notice the professor says "if a writer starts to think too deeply about what he is writing". Can we explore what he means by this?
  • dorothyddorothyd
    does he mean, if you begin dissecting the work almost immediately, which sometimes happens. Instead of getting a flow of words down, you stop to analyse each part or what your characters are doing and why, rather than letting them get on with it. Just a thought.
  • lexialexia
    edited March 2009
    Dwight - maybe I need to check his exact words again, but from a live interview, dorothy's thought is what I took his words to mean.

    Of course we are not just talking of "story" as in fiction here. As Claudia says, when writing an article, yes you are telling a story in a way, but characterisation is not perhaps needing so much attention - as the "characters" are ready made, real life people !

    I also find it difficult NOT to edit as I go along - which in it's turn causes DEEP thinking about the piece, at the time.
    (I now wonder if I am contradicting myself...I feel an article coming on about this philosophising............. ;) )
  • lexialexia
    Post script to last post - note the "edited" word next to my name :)
  • DwightDwight
    Yes, what Dorothy says fits in with the way I like to do my writing, with the odd correction as you go. I think I have mentioned before how I like to work out the pathway ahead, into scenes in a chain. There can be a spot of writer's block before beginning a scene (where shall I start it? what are they doing? who will speak first?) but it's a lovely feeling once you have begun a scene and that flow gets going.
  • LizLiz
    perhaps this is an argument for nanoremo or whatever it's called...
  • JennyJenny
    (New Ladies No. 1 Detective Agency episode this evening - 9pm on BBC1.)
  • CarolCarol
    You have to go with the flow I agree.
  • ClaudiaClaudia
    I took the "start thinking too deeply" to mean analysing the words, grammar etc as you are writing which I'm sure can stop the natural flow. I try to get down the 'bones', knowing I will go back and sort out what I've written. Does that make sense?
  • CarolCarol
    Yes, get the story down, and return to the technicalities in revisions later on.
  • DwightDwight
    A while ago the 'How to...' book I was reading (can't remember which one it was) said: don't keep stopping to re-read; leave it for a week before reviewing what you have written.

    But now I feel I want to go all the way and finish the book before doing my revisions. Perhaps the odd look back to check whether I had mentioned such and such already, but no wasting time 'seeing if it's all right up to now'. On my first book, that was a form of work-avoidance for me.
  • dorothyddorothyd
    that's good thinking, actually.
  • RichardSRichardS
    That what pretty much how I finished my first draft, Dwight. Just plough on through to the end - with the odd reference back to check facts - and then spend time now editing, revising and polishing.

    It seems to be working ok. (He says, fingers crossed!)
  • ClaudiaClaudia
    edited March 2009
    I can't even stop myself re-reading when I'm writing a 1,000 word article, let alone a book! I'm really, really going to try to stop the re-reading with my next piece to see if the results are ultimately any better.
Sign In or Register to comment.