Different Strokes for Different Folks

Every writer has his or her own preferences when it comes to their personal writing process, and I think most would agree that one size does not fit all. My own writing process has evolved over the course of several years, and one of the issues I struggled with at length was whether to write my novel drafts using longhand or using a word processor. In this article I’ll explain which approach I ultimately chose and why I made that choice.

A number of years ago, I visited the website of one of my favorite authors and was thrilled to find an article he had posted about his writing process. When I learned that he wrote out his novels longhand and then had someone transcribe them, I was stunned. I couldn’t believe that in this day and age of computing someone would take such an archaic…circa early 1970s…approach to writing. That explained, at least in my own mind, why this very popular author only produced one book every year or two.

At the time I was just getting started in fiction writing, and my approach was to use the computer for jotting down notes, documenting scene summaries, and then drafting and refining the actual story text. My problem was, while I always started out this way, I would get bogged down very quickly. I chalked this up to the fact that writing was hard and that’s just the way it was supposed to be. I also discovered that I made better progress by scribbling on pen and paper, and I was drawn strongly in that direction. Every time I drifted back to the keyboard approach it was ultimately abandoned in favor of longhand. And this really bothered me. It bothered me a lot. Being a computer professional by training I was certainly not technophobic, and I could touch type at a decent clip. Oh, the guilt. What was wrong with me? How come other writers could bang merrily away on their keyboards, but I couldn’t? I didn’t know why, but I just didn’t find it a natural or effective way to work. It felt too linear and confining. For some unknown reason, I preferred to consume stacks of yellow pads, trying to decipher my scribbled handwriting and margin notes, following swooping arrows that encircled paragraphs destined to be inserted in various places in the twenty-or-so pages I had handwritten. But…it worked. At least for me it did.

Then one day I figured it out. I did some research and learned a bit about how the human brain works. It turns out that when we write things out longhand, and when we write using a keyboard, different areas of the brain are stimulated. When we write longhand, more of the creative areas of our brain come into play, and we are better able to think in terms of phrases, ideas, and concepts. When we use a keyboard, we tend to think more in terms of individual characters and words and less in terms of the bigger picture. Once I learned this, the guilt and frustration immediately disappeared, and I no longer had any problem pulling out a yellow pad and letting the creative me get down to work.

Of course, I haven’t abandoned my trusty computer. Now, I write out each scene in the book longhand, a couple of scenes at a time. I then crank up my word processor and begin typing and editing as I go. When I’m finished I give everything a once-over, apply any needed edits, and I’m ready to submit to my critique group.

Understanding why I prefer the stroke of a pen to the click of a keyboard helped make me a more productive, and happier, writer. Will the same approach work for every writer? It probably won’t. Like the title of this article says…different strokes for different folks.

~ Joe Demasco