Tuesday, August 27, 2013

Writing Techniques of Famous Writers

How Hunter S. Thompson crafted his colorful prose is absent.
Interesting to discover how successful writers rolled out the words. Some literally banged them out on a typewriter, while others wrote long-hand. Still others stood or sat or wrote in chaos or skipped lunches with other famous people while they worked.

Here's a quote from Hemingway I liked:

"You write until you come to a place where you still have your juice and know what will happen next and you stop and try to live through until the next day when you hit it again."

I've also found it helpful to leave a little in the tank. My problem is leaving too much in the tank and veering off to other projects. Then I can't find my juice, though it's usually in a large sippie cup.

Read the rest of Maria Popova's article over at brain pickings

Image: junglemagazine.com

2 comments:

Unknown said...

YAAAAY!!!! I'm not the only one in that group. I find that I'm just starting to get into THE ZONE and then I have to go to work. Maybe writing just before going to work isn't a great idea after all. Maybe I should do it after work, when I have HOURS to lose myself. Because it does take time to get back into that zone once I'm out of it for a bit.

How do you keep yourself from distractions? All advice gratefully accepted (if not heeded) ;)

JP Mac said...

I work to a timer that goes off after an hour. If I've goofed off, I resolve to do better the next hour then start again.

Turning off the Web while you're writing has also proven helpful.

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