Writing speed

The longest I've taken is the novella I sent off this weekend, which in its original form was started in 1990. The quickest is probably one of my 1500-2500 word stories that were pretty much just an hour of continuous typing, but those tend to be the ones where you look at them, go, "Oh, that's clever," and then write something totally different to actually show people.

Songs are usually written fairly quickly and then moderately tweaked, although it often takes a few days of planning before I sit down and *write* the song.

Thank you.

although, there are exceptions: the uk garage piece i wrote for the reader took four months, mostly due to rewrites.

2. i have trouble, with, pacing, with. rhythm, with. writing something that doesn't sound, horribly convolouted when read aloud.. i think this is also partly a typing problem. i'm jealous of some of you.

Music helps me with pacing, but I write fiction ... it doesn't help me as much when I have non-fiction things I need to do.

However long it takes I always feel like I should have put in at least another hour.

I'm a lot slower as an editor, as Jess can attest.

But see .. this is what I mean, about me lacking the fundamentals necessary to grok. Build what? I can't visualize what's going on there.

For a story, I start with "well, I've got this character" or "what if X happened" or "I want something that makes people feel the way I felt when I read/saw Y." I sort of figure out what's lacking from that initial idea, what blanks need to be filled in, and whether I have options as to how to fill them. There's a pretty basic introduce-conflict, establish-status-quo, complicate, resolve formula for short stories, so the rest is pretty much laid out for me, but beyond "here's a verse, here's a chorus, here's a bridge," I don't have the ear to pick up on the equivalent structure in songs.

I think you'll find that even a single songwriter probably has a bunch of different answers to that question.

The most common starting point is "do you write the music or the words first?" to which most of the songwriters I know (including myself) usually answer, "it depends."

But I'm with Millar... usually it's a phrase or a couple lines or at best a single verse. After that it's building around it. Not that terribly different to me than building a short story around an idea for a scene that is particularly exciting to the author.

I'm not a pro either, unless you count the time I spent in nyc with an agent trying to sell some of my screenplays to no avail. I have been the primary songwriter for just about every band I've ever been in though.

Tep, I think the song thing (at least in pop/rock) really IS "here's a verse, here's a chorus, here's a bridge." Depending on the writer, other structure may be employed. (i.e. I personally like to approach songs as stories, so to some extent I'm usually trying to overlay "introduce-conflict, estabilish-status-quo, complicate, etc." on top of "intro, verse, chorus, verse, chorus, bridge, verse, chorus, out.")

the verse, chorus, verse form doesn't imply content quite as well as the basic short story form.

here's something that's not as catchy and makes v. little sense - here's something that's not as catchy and makes v. little sense - HERE'S SOMETHING REALLY CATCHY AND BASIC, IT'S CATCHY AND BASIC AND DUMB
here's something that's not as catchy and makes v. little sense - ETC. ETC.

This makes me think I might almost get it, which is probably misleading :)

I suppose I should probably think of it as cooking, and me as a guy who doesn't know what cinnamon or chicken are.

Ironically, the most recent story I've sent out for submission is about a musician (but he only does cover songs, so I didn't need to deal with him writing songs, per se).

True. But I think songwriting (or at least lyric writing) shares a lot more with poetry than prose, so it would stand to reason that it'd have developed conceits.

Jody, I tend to feel the same way about my prose writing in that I habitually seem to revisit the same kinds of characters and conflicts. I don't feel that way as much about my songwriting. I wonder what the difference is exactly between a "habit" and "one's own voice." I'm certain there is a difference, but is it something more than personal comfort with said "habits?"

oh, and thanks, ron. just don't anybody ask me anything about writing comics, cause I still have no idea what I'm doing there.

The problem is, I just can't get going.

I was planning on doing more writing tonight on That There Novel to finish it up but I then proceeded to fall asleep for about two or so hours, maybe more. D'oh.

But on the other hand, it takes me ages to write in my little travel journal. I sit and think and think and think [i have lots of time to think here] but nothing seems to get written except nonsense and descrptions of cute backpackers who i wish were sharing a dorm with me instead of with those dutch girls. bitches.

(a) Wander around thinking up a point. (one week)
(b) Write 1200 words. (one hour)
(c) Retype using different tone / "less words." (one hour)
(d) Realize piece is now 1400 words. (one stupid second)
(e) Slash piece down to 900 words. (one hour)
(f) "Close enough." (one second)

Rilly sparing with revisions unless I'm asked to make em.

With music it's a process of constantly fooling around with ideas for an hour or two each and then putting most of them aside as just not working out. Then I'll listen back through them and pick out all the good ideas and run a song together in an afternoon -- four or five hours. These days, though, I'm trying to actually spend lots of time on songs, so a 3-minute track is taking a total of maybe 30 hours -- fiddling, building, tweaking, etc.

you so belong at law school, gabe. you'll get all the write-it-down-now-or-die essay exams you can handle (and the bar exam's the same way)!

I think maybe the lack of feedback is one thing that makes me totally not bothered or inspired. A lot of external stresses too, but nothing I can do about that until they're resolved.

Longer pieces are generally a much different matter. At work I do one major computer review a month, and a lot of that month is spent doing the research and hands-on testing. For shorter one-off reviews it can be about an hour for between 500-1000 words if I've already thoroughly looked at the product, and then a bit of editing time after that. For longer music-related pieces, I generally only write them when I am really spurred to do so, which means they generally pour out of me fairly quickly, and then I try to polish (sometimes more successfully than others).

One factor that shouldn't be underestimated here is the coffee factor. If I try to do a piece after I've had too much coffee, getting words out of my brain that actually sound good is like trying to squeeze slowly-hardening concrete out of a pasta machine: I can certainly do it for the first little bit, but it gets harder and harder as it goes on, and lord knows no one would want to try to digest the results.

I mean, how likely is it?

I should start!!!!

when you have 250 words to squeeze out but you have already said everything you can, in 1750, and your only choice it to repeat 250 of your earlier words, mostly 'the' and 'and'.

(still got 2500+ words about an old book I haven't really read and 1000 or so about my most recent design project and the sustainability I didn't design in but will have to tack on so I can write 1000 or so words about it) (9 hours left?)

(thanks nick and I really have been good, mostly!!!!)

Writing about books you haven't read is what university is about!

Keep it up.

what's your excuse?

; )

I still hope for them to be passed.