Apparently it is my day to signalboost.

[browngirl]

This is for everyone doing National Novel Writing Month. I've done NaNoWriMo in the past and may again in the future; I loved it.

I've also been dismayed when people inevitably try to dissuade people from participating in it, saying that one can do "better" things, such as Ms. Miller on Salon, who somehow assumes that NaNo participants aren't also reading and suggests that people should read 10 novels in November instead of writing one.

It boggles my mind that anyone who writes could manage not to understand that writing and reading satisfy different urges for many people, but, well, I try not to make a hobby of ordering people to cease participating in an activity that pleases them and harms no one. So.

If you're doing NaNoWriMo this year, I advise you to ignore the people telling you not to, maybe read this instead and above all else write if you want to. Writing, like all creativity, feeds the soul; the people trying to dissuade you from it are trying to starve you, and you deserve to be nourished. (Yes, that's a cheesy metaphor, but I earnestly mean it.)

Comments

[thistlerose.livejournal.com]

writing and reading satisfy different urges for many people

This is exactly right.

*did not almost just write "exactly write"*

Granted I haven't read the article, but I don't understand encouraging people not to think creatively and put their ideas to (virtual) paper.

[boosette.livejournal.com]

*reads the LA Times article with glee*

The Salon article sounds like nothing so much as a more pretentious way of saying:




"You guys stop having fun!"

[yeomanrand.livejournal.com]

Well, don'tcha know, the Salon person is whining because some pro editors have whined to her about the crap that will be coming their way post-November. About which I have this to say:

The slush pile will always be there. If you can't deal with it, get another job.

[karadin.livejournal.com]

Meh, people will do what they want, she's probably annoyed she didnt come up with the idea!

[jane_potter]

You are an awesome signalbooster. I hadn't even see the Salon article before now, but frankly that article just made me all the more determined to finish me NaNo. I am not one of the people who can or will ever be dissuaded from writing, but on behalf of those who, without the support of all you signalboosters and cheerleaders out there, might have given up in the face of this incomprehensible negativity, thank you. Thank you. *hugs*

Edit: Wait, sorry, I just found something else that needed to be shared:


What I particularly like was some of the comments on Miller's article saying how NaNo was actually a harmful experience because it makes aspiring writers realise how bad they are at it. Yes, really.

[yeomanrand.livejournal.com]

What I particularly like was some of the comments on Miller's article saying how NaNo was actually a harmful experience because it makes aspiring writers realise how bad they are at it. Yes, really.

....wat?

(3,380 and counting)

[jane_potter]

To quote a seriously delusional "nick_r":

"But for the group it [NaNoWriMo] seems most geared to (non-writers who have always wanted to take a stab at it), I think it could cause real harm. Think about it -- you've never written much before, and now here you are driving yourself crazy for a month to fill hundreds of pages with whatever you can think of. That brief sense of accomplishment at the end is nice, I'm sure, but what happens once you look back at what you've written and realize how dreadful it is? Or when no one else wants to read more than a hundred words of it? The natural inclination at that point would be to go right back into your shell and stay there. And that's a shame, because if you'd tried dipping a toe in the pool (writing a short story, an essay or two, a one-act play, etc.) you might have had a better chance at cultivating the creative seed within, and gradually becoming an actual writer."

Wait, let me say that again.

AN ACTUAL WRITER.

Get out of my garden, nick_r; I'll cultivate it however I goddamn want. And while I'm at it, I'll gradually make myself an actual woman and an actual casual scribler-artist and an actual tea drinker, too.

[yeomanrand.livejournal.com]

I agree with your icon and with your comment. In a mild interest in "being fair", I suppose he could mean "a published writer" as opposed to "an actual writer," but even still.

NO.

I have failed at NaNo every year I've participated in it (since...2006, I think? Maybe 2005? I forget). But every year, I've learned something, and I sincerely doubt shinychimera and I would have completed our behemoth "In for Repairs" story if the two of us didn't have our (incomplete) NaNos under our belt.

I have no appropriate icons for this. My "Piss off, reading" icon doesn't work.

[elmathelas.livejournal.com]

When I'm writing for nanowrimo, since I'm writing to a deadline and with purpose as opposed to waiting for a flight of fancy to just take me and wing me headlong into a fully formed fic (which does happen, but oh so rarely) I feel like I'm constantly writing against a strong tide of thoughts of THIS SUCKS I SUCK THIS SUCKS OMG THIS SUCKS but I keep going, and I think that, more than anything else, is worth the experience. If I can get over being my own worst enemy, even if just for a month, that's an accomplishment that no amount of nay-saying can take away from me.


Ha Ha! I say. Realize that.

[jane_potter]

PREACH. *fistbumps*

[re-white.livejournal.com]

Beautiful icon.

[rubynye.livejournal.com]

*nod* I also have to crawl over huge mental boulders of "I'm wasting time / so and so whom I respect doesn't like this kind of story/I should wash the dishes instead / I SUCK I SUCK I SUCK" every time I write. Poisonous "advice" like the Salon piece is one more boulder; sensible encouragement like the LA Times piece is a lever to wedge the boulders back out of the way.

[boosette.livejournal.com]

I'm actually not doing NaNo this year specifically because the last three attempts wound me up with tendonitis, so the pace, and the brilliant many-thousands-of-words-per-day games of catch-up with write-or-die are physically bad for me, but to others who can finish I say:

MORE POWER TO YOU GO GO GO!!

[rubynye.livejournal.com]

*blushes and hugs you back* Thank you, and you're very welcome.

Also, ICON OF TRUTH.

[canis-takahari.livejournal.com]

Discouraging someone to do anything that they're excited about has never made any sense to me. I will always make this face in response:

>:|

Telling someone to read instead of write when people have the capacity to do BOTH is just fucking ridiculous. Why read 10 novels instead? Why not do both? Or, you know, stop telling people what to do? I write because I want to write. Sometimes that means I don't want to read, and sometimes that means when I got bored or frustrated with writing, I will read something instead.

[yeomanrand.livejournal.com]

Not to mention that it's the rare person indeed who reads fast enough to get through 10 novels in a month. I read very quickly, and I'm not sure I could do that! (Well, unless they were all very short novels, or om nom nom beach fare or something, but still.)

Though this does remind me that I need to go to the bookstore and pick up Red Hood's Revenge.

[canis-takahari.livejournal.com]

Ahaha, I didn't even think of that, you're right! I read fairly slowly if I'm really enjoying a book because I tend to savour the writing. 10 novels in a month would be really stretching it for me, unless they were all teeny-tiny.

[starsandgraces]

I've never understood how people can be so invested in how someone else chooses to spend their time. If someone they know is doing NaNo, how does it hurt them? Jeez. I've only tried to do it once and didn't succeed because I went into it half-cocked and without anything but a vague idea, but the idea that people are actively discouraging others from taking part is just moronic.

[sororcula.livejournal.com]

LOL, I love the LA Times article. Knitters don't knit because their friends need more hats. But so far, there hasn't been a "Better yet, DON'T knit that scarf" manifesto. Hahahahahaha.

[claudia603.livejournal.com]

Maybe people writing stuff like that are threatened by potentially awesome works that could come out of it. Humph. *writes away*

[melissima.livejournal.com]

I don't want to live in Laura Miller's parsimonious universe where my creativity steals oxygen from someone else's, and my urge to create somehow makes me a bad audience for others' creations.

To borrow (and possibly twist) a term of Cat Valente's, I want to be a Fat Buddha of books and wordy things. I want to make as many as I can, read as many as I can, cheer for as many as I can, love as many as I can.

If she wants to turn her life into a desert island with a hundred books on it or a thousand, I wish her well, but I won't be visiting. She can come see me, when she gets bored. ;)

[melissima.livejournal.com]

And also isn't that LA Times article great? There should be more articles like that in the world. "What can it hurt? Try it! Go You!"

:Beams: Awesome.

[vass]

It's interesting you should mention Cat Valente, because I distinctly remember her wanking all over a NaNoWriMo forum on LJ about five years ago about how people who just write whatever they feel like for NaNo should be ashamed and are doing it wrong, and how unlike them, she writes quality, polished stuff for NaNo.

Why yes, that did piss me off enough that I've never read any of her books or short stories, even though I edited one of her short stories in Critters and thought she had a lot of talent.

[monkey5s.livejournal.com]

Hmm, I see the LA Times writer was unaware that there is a NaSweKniMo going on in November, as well. Showing solidarity with the writers, some knitters are challenging themselves to knit (and finish) a sweater during the month.

And, as far as the "writing a lot of crap" aspect of NaNo, I always think of Stephen King's assertion, that the first million or so words you write will likely be crap, so get cracking on that, so you can get past it to the good stuff. AR AR AR!