A Writing Proposition

[penmage]

When I went to hear Terry Pratchett a bit ago, someone asked him for advice for aspiring writers. He said a bunch of things, but one thing that lodged itself in my brain was that for the last 6 years, he's written 400 words a day. Every day. If he knew he was going to miss a day, he'd make it up in advance; if he missed a day without meaning to, he'd make it up the next day. 400 words, about anything. Just make up characters and have them talk to each other, if you have nothing better to write. The idea is to keep constantly writing, to keep in the habit, to keep the words flowing.

I'd like to try this summer. To write 400 words a day, every day. Is anyone interested in doing this with me? If there's enough interest and someone's got a spare code, we can make a community, maybe have it be a different person's job to suggest a loose topic each day.

Anyone interested?

Comments

[rysmiel.livejournal.com]

This is not the first time I've heard advice of this sort; Gene Wolfe and Harlan Ellison have both given similar advice in print. Basically, it works if you have a life you can bend around that way. There is a valid point that in order to write, you have to get writing done; but I don't think doing it daily necessarily works for everyone. [ Published counterexample; Iain M. Banks, who writes like a maniac two months of the year and does nothing the other ten. ]

Myself, I aim to do a chapter a week, on one or two evenings a week, and that has, since I've started doing wordcounts here, tended to come out as 3000-4000 words every week. Which seems reasonable to me.