Interlude: Servetus on blogging

This is going to be one of those “how sausage is made” posts. Look away as necessary.

There’s a ton of advice out there for would-be writers. I have read and been influenced by some of it, but on the whole I think the advice manual genre is overrated in terms of its actual results. The diet that’s fantastic for you has no effect on me, and so on. Mostly, I find, getting things done is a matter of asking for advice, trying different stuff, muddling through, and revising your strategy for next time. I’m always fairly suspicious when I read a writer telling other writers about the only way to do something. I also have taught English composition and now spend a lot of time teaching a sort of triage version of historical writing, and those experiences bear out my feeling that no advice is 100 percent applicable. For instance, I would say, after a decade and a half of teaching and observing results, that most student writers of historical essays — nine out of ten whom I have taught or coached, or more — are significantly benefited by brainstorming ideas, then writing a thesis statement and outline before they start writing actual prose. In contrast, free writing is the big thing that writing teachers encourage these days, but in my own experience as a reader of essays I get way too much free writing turned in — students think that’s all they have to do. I almost wish my students wouldn’t free write. However, I was a free writer well before I learned what free writing was, and so I almost never start writing with a thesis and outline, never did, and yet I have dozens of publications to my credit. Most student writers don’t write enough, however, to understand their own processes very well, and in the choice between creativity and the finished project, most will prefer the finished project and are thus more practically benefited by the brainstorming / thesis / outline style of writing, even if it doesn’t create the pleasure and enjoyment in writing that free writing might. (Why student writers aren’t writing enough is a political question, so I’ll stay away from it here. Though, of course, I have opinions.)

Anyway, the books on writing that have probably influenced me the most as a writer are Robert Boice, Professors as Writers and Julia Cameron, The Artist’s Way. (Which someone who reads here recommended to me — thanks, that has been most useful as a corrective to what I see now as pedantic moments in Boice, and as a reminder of things I had forgotten about myself as writer!) They are drastically different insofar as Boice is writing explicitly to deal with the problems of junior faculty whose careers depend on their writing but whose time for it is often crowded out by daily work, and Cameron is providing a template for people who want to get in touch with their creativity (not usually a major concern of academic writers). They do share one important component, however: both of them think one has to write a little every day (or as many days as possible). This recommendation absolutely fits with my M.O. as a writer. I’m a more successful writer when I do it every day. I know a lot of people swear by not planning writing, and “waiting for inspiration,” but that doesn’t work for me. You should write how it suits you, but I find that when I “wait for inspiration,” it more seldom comes then when I commit to writing and I stumble over some inspiration while I’m doing the sort of “writing work out” that might be unlikely to produce anything really publishable / keepable. There are other tricks, but the insistence on writing every day has been most helpful to me. And this is why it’s most worrying (and feels like death) when I’m not writing for a sustained period. I imagine this is how dedicated joggers feel about weather that keeps them inside for more than a day or two.

So the consequence of this attitude is that I constantly feel like I’m restarting. A few days when I have to grade, or pack, or drive, or can’t write, means that when I get back to it (and since February 2010 it’s constantly on my mind — what’s next? when will I get to write again?) I have to spend precious time calming the inner uproar of ideas. I’ve been trying to do that the last few days but I admit that the amazing weather and the feeling that I don’t have any obligations till August means that I’ve been more dilatory than I would have been under other circumstances. In other words, I think what happens when I write every day is that I have a direction and a flow for writing in mind and I don’t have to stop and think about what’s next. When I don’t write every day, then I have to go back to the brainstorming / thesis statement / outlining procedure that I (and my students) find so tedious. But if that’s the only way to distill something keepable from my writing, then that’s what I’ll do.

So here are some things that are on my mind for the blog.

• finishing the Richard Armitage identity thing I started in May of 2010
• publication of Armitage “I” statements — compilation
• finishing the North & South series (2 posts left — pressing)
• finishing the Armitage barbatus series (3-4 posts left — pressing)
• the sexy jeans posts
• resume blogging about Guy / Robin Hood. Long abandoned because of my internal fears. Probably can’t do this until N&S is finished
• The “value added Armitage” thing on what Armitage brings to N&S, languishing a long time
• Ditto on the Chris Ryan Strike Back novel
• Feminist politics and Guy of Gisborne — urged upon me by Judiang a long time ago
• On that scene in SB 1.2 and feminist politics
• Watch Captain America more closely. Not enough has been written about this yet.
• the candid pix of young Armitage post that’s been on my mind since December
• more analysis of Armitage’s acting — this has fallen off because the level of detail requires more concentration then I am typically able to achieve during the school year, but I’ve got a lot of stuff stacked up
• Richard Armitage and interiority
• another “liking food” post
• Acting / playing humiliation
• Flirting with the eyes
• violence / hitting women
• finishing the “Ugly American” (Sarah Caulfield / Lucas North) analysis series
• finishing the “Genesis of Perving” series
• stuff on Richard III, biography vs history, also Richard’s piety. Lots to be said here
• Armitage anatomy, esp. eyes and shoulders
• Spooks 9. Grrrr.
• publish next sexual fantasy stuff. Harder to do than I realized it would be when it exploded out of me that day, but really personally productive.
• Piece on Sparkhouse fanfics and why these stories won’t leave me alone.
• on getting into The Hobbit.
• Long U vowels compilation vid — half done. More analysis of accent / language / U.S. accent
• That Between the Sheets stuff that’s been on my mind since March of 2010
• Ditto for Clarissa
• my feelings about Vicar of Dibley (fear of reaction)
• Three half done music fanvids!
• bunch of stuff on Venetia after listening to it three times recently
• Thoughts I have about an Armitageworld friend who’s encountering a new British actor addiction / sympathies
• On the struggle between principle and desire, pleasing others and following one’s own path, service and creativity
• On the relationship of this writing to other projects I have
• Finishing up a few stalled fan interviews and a few more I’d like to do but haven’t gotten around to writing invitations for yet …

I’m not polling on this stuff, because I don’t know exactly what will emerge next, or whether what you want to read is what I will want to write on any given day, but it helps to list it all along with the priorities and reasons it hasn’t been finished. More importantly, I’ve got something like 75,000 unpublished words in drafts and I want that stuff out there and gone before the premiere of The Hobbit.

Right now, however, I have to go home and make sure my father is not on the roof (the insurance money for the hail damage finally came through, and when I left the contractor had just gotten there), which is where all of our misery with regard to his health started, and get dinner going. Hope to be back again tonight!

~ by Servetus on May 14, 2012.