Last Saturday, the Rockville Writers' Group proudly hosted a Free Writing workshop at the home of one of its members, Kathy. This event was significant in more ways than one-first, it was the first workshop this group has organized or hosted and second, the event was a great success.
This workshop on Free Writing was led by poet, teacher extraordinaire and an outstanding speaker, Douglas Goestch (www.douglasgoestch.com). Starting from 9 in the morning till about 5 that evening, Doug engaged us, the attendees, in a variety of exercises. They ranged from writing a paragraph about a simple, randomly picked word to complex themes involving 'memory and invention.' They were all interesting and challenging without being oppressive or tiresome. At the end of the day and about 8 exercises later, we came away refreshed, our minds excited and open to new possibilities.
For me, it was a great learning experience. I have written about it on my blog at www.sgbasu.com. To avoid being repetitive, I am posting an excerpt here. A click on the text below will take you to the full post.
"A few months ago, my compatriot Kathy, at the Rockville Writers Group gushed about this wonderful weekend she had spent in New Hampshire, attending a workshop on Free Writing by Douglas Goestch. She had enjoyed it very much. Her excitement was infectious and within 5 mins the rest of our group wanted to know more about this ‘free writing,’ and all of us wanted to attend the workshop the following year."
Doug spoke about the importance of free writing as a training and I agree wholeheartedly. The following (in my own words), is what truly made me a believer in the power of free writing:
A practitioner of any art (or sciences for that matter) takes care of his/her tools and keeps those tools sharp by training and training hard. For writers, that tool is the brain. We need to keep our brains sharp and nimble and flexible. Free writing is a training that we can provide the brain to keep it always at its sharpest.
Happy sharpening to you all!
~ Rupa Basu
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Tuesday, November 18, 2014
Saturday, March 22, 2014
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
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
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