Eaten by NaNoWriMo

[notalwaysweak]

I miss you all very much and I fail at being here and the plotbunnies are swarming again...

Anyone else here partaking of the month of madness?

 

[Kurokami]

Indeed, although I am rather falling behind so far. I plan to devote a bit of time next week to catching up and eventually getting ahead. Actually, my planned sci-fi BDSM novel will, with any luck, eventually make its way up here to Lit anyway, so that might be good.

This is my first NaNoWriMo, and I'm honestly surprised by how much fun it is, while remaining as hard to write as usual. Removing the demand for immediate and constant quality really frees me up to just have fun with the narrative. It's great

 

[intothewoods]

I miss you all very much and I fail at being here and the plotbunnies are swarming again...

Anyone else here partaking of the month of madness?

Me, me!

I'm behind already and am trying to write like gangbusters this weekend.

 

[Kurokami]

Hey, I feel way better knowing I'm not the only one who's behind, here!

 

[IrisAlthea]

I miss you all very much and I fail at being here and the plotbunnies are swarming again...

Anyone else here partaking of the month of madness?

I wanted to but this month is crazy busy.

 

[marieR19]

*hugs fellow NaNoers!!*

I participate every year, and am technically on-par wordcount-wise so far. But I'm not enjoying it at all. This past week I've been in the hospital twice, had multiple tests besides that, and there are more to come. I'm really just not interested in trying to hack out the words this year.

But ALL of my friends on another writing-based forum do NaNo (the forum was actually started by NaNoers), so if I don't then I feel completely left out the entire month. .... I don't know.

Sorry to be a downer. *cheers everyone*

 

[notalwaysweak]

I'm not behind yet, but my characters are not as vocal as usual and I'm trying to get them to talk, in the sense that I can't capture their voices, not that there's a lack of dialogue. (There's a lack of dialogue as well, but that's another issue altogether.)

 

[Etoile]

I don't read fiction, so I certainly wouldn't write it! Good luck y'all.

 

[Lord_Steve]

perhaps some of you who are conversant with the role of the jester in western literature will understand why I, the motley'd Fool of this lovely forum, have to stir this particular shit.

NaNoWriMo is a really bad idea, a well-meaning but entirely misguided exercise. Writing, when considered as the simple act of transferring black marks onto a white page in such a way as other members of the same culture can comprehend, is not hard. Writing something that is good or worthwhile is difficult, to the extent that talented and inspired people may spend their whole lives attempting it and failing.

Please, don't take this the wrong way. I encourage you write. Write your brains out, write until your keyboard is bloody, try to be the next Aeschylus or Hemingway or McCarthy or whoever it is that you revere. Just please, please don't try to skip to the end of the process. Educate yourself. Read incandescent and glorious books. Write a hundred awful short stories. Expose your friends to your work at every stage, but only if you trust them to be as brutal as they must.

Start at the beginning, as everybody must. Don't forget that writing is an art older than painting and less forgiving besides. Respect what you are trying to achieve.

oh

and

hey nonny nonny

 

[notalwaysweak]

My maxim is that it's impossible to edit a blank page. I'd rather get the words down and then make them right than never write them at all.

 

[Etoile]

perhaps some of you who are conversant with the role of the jester in western literature will understand why I, the motley'd Fool of this lovely forum, have to stir this particular shit.

NaNoWriMo is a really bad idea, a well-meaning but entirely misguided exercise. Writing, when considered as the simple act of transferring black marks onto a white page in such a way as other members of the same culture can comprehend, is not hard. Writing something that is good or worthwhile is difficult, to the extent that talented and inspired people may spend their whole lives attempting it and failing.

Please, don't take this the wrong way. I encourage you write. Write your brains out, write until your keyboard is bloody, try to be the next Aeschylus or Hemingway or McCarthy or whoever it is that you revere. Just please, please don't try to skip to the end of the process. Educate yourself. Read incandescent and glorious books. Write a hundred awful short stories. Expose your friends to your work at every stage, but only if you trust them to be as brutal as they must.

Start at the beginning, as everybody must. Don't forget that writing is an art older than painting and less forgiving besides. Respect what you are trying to achieve.

oh

and

hey nonny nonny

You're going to be an English professor someday, right? Please?

 

[Cattypuss]

I don't read fiction

I know that people like this are out there but every time I come across one of them I am stopped dead by pure astonishment. To me not reading fiction would be like not having sex or not listening to music or not watching movies or not eating food that tastes nice!

 

[intothewoods]

perhaps some of you who are conversant with the role of the jester in western literature will understand why I, the motley'd Fool of this lovely forum, have to stir this particular shit.

NaNoWriMo is a really bad idea, a well-meaning but entirely misguided exercise. Writing, when considered as the simple act of transferring black marks onto a white page in such a way as other members of the same culture can comprehend, is not hard. Writing something that is good or worthwhile is difficult, to the extent that talented and inspired people may spend their whole lives attempting it and failing.

Please, don't take this the wrong way. I encourage you write. Write your brains out, write until your keyboard is bloody, try to be the next Aeschylus or Hemingway or McCarthy or whoever it is that you revere. Just please, please don't try to skip to the end of the process. Educate yourself. Read incandescent and glorious books. Write a hundred awful short stories. Expose your friends to your work at every stage, but only if you trust them to be as brutal as they must.

Start at the beginning, as everybody must. Don't forget that writing is an art older than painting and less forgiving besides. Respect what you are trying to achieve.

oh

and

hey nonny nonny

I totally get this perspective, but I think it's a good exercise to force yourself to do it differently. I agonize when I write, and I'm constantly editing everything before I'm finished. It's good for me to force myself to just keep writing no matter what.

I know that people like this are out there but every time I come across one of them I am stopped dead by pure astonishment. To me not reading fiction would be like not having sex or not listening to music or not watching movies or not eating food that tastes nice!

I know, I almost posted this! To me it's like only liking one type of cuisine -- gasp!

 

[BiBunny]

perhaps some of you who are conversant with the role of the jester in western literature will understand why I, the motley'd Fool of this lovely forum, have to stir this particular shit.

NaNoWriMo is a really bad idea, a well-meaning but entirely misguided exercise. Writing, when considered as the simple act of transferring black marks onto a white page in such a way as other members of the same culture can comprehend, is not hard. Writing something that is good or worthwhile is difficult, to the extent that talented and inspired people may spend their whole lives attempting it and failing.

Please, don't take this the wrong way. I encourage you write. Write your brains out, write until your keyboard is bloody, try to be the next Aeschylus or Hemingway or McCarthy or whoever it is that you revere. Just please, please don't try to skip to the end of the process. Educate yourself. Read incandescent and glorious books. Write a hundred awful short stories. Expose your friends to your work at every stage, but only if you trust them to be as brutal as they must.

Start at the beginning, as everybody must. Don't forget that writing is an art older than painting and less forgiving besides. Respect what you are trying to achieve.

oh

and

hey nonny nonny

Agreed. There's no reason to make yourself batshit trying to cram it all in in a month. If the idea is meaningful enough to you, you'll finish.

 

[_Stardust]

I'm trying this again, but uni work and illness are conspiring against me at the moment. It's nice to know I'm not the only one having problems. Best of luck to everybody who's taking part!

 

[the captians wench]

Okay, this is the first time I have looked at the thread tital and not read "Eat my NaNoWriMo"

 

[intothewoods]

I have to add, also, that I think most people doing Nanowrimo are aware that this isn't the way to write. They know it's a nutty exercise.

You're going to be an English professor someday, right? Please?

And btw, my English professor slash writer friend thinks it's a cool idea.

 

[Lord_Steve]

I have to add, also, that I think most people doing Nanowrimo are aware that this isn't the way to write. They know it's a nutty exercise.



And btw, my English professor slash writer friend thinks it's a cool idea.

a valid criticism of my grandiose claim, to be sure, and I certainly don't begrudge your professor/writer friend his opinion.

the issue, i feel, is one of signal/noise ratio. for every writer who finds their honest muse in the attempt there seem to be twenty nascent steampunk/sci-fi/fanfiction/enormously boring slice-of-life drama stories being dredged creakily into the open air when they might have better been left to rot in the darkness.

it's an exercise that fails because the it lacks structure beyond the cold mechanical detail of words/day which does nothing to ensure quality and much to discourage it.

again, don't misunderstand me, if you wish to be a writer it is very important to write steadily and not stall, but that self-discipline needs to come from a place of passion and self-honesty if it's going to be useful.

but anyway, i have no rancor towards the participants in nanowrimo and i wish them the best of luck. more people should write for sure, it's only the approach i find problematic.

 

[Etoile]

Lord Steve, if Literotica had a "Like" button, I would like every single one of your posts.

 

[FurryFury]

*hugs*

I've never done NaNoWriMo or whatever but I hope to someday. Right now I always feel like I'm constantly running out of time in every single day. I do believe that writing some everyday is a good idea. I just don't do it. Maybe someday.

*hugs fellow NaNoers!!*

I participate every year, and am technically on-par wordcount-wise so far. But I'm not enjoying it at all. This past week I've been in the hospital twice, had multiple tests besides that, and there are more to come. I'm really just not interested in trying to hack out the words this year.

But ALL of my friends on another writing-based forum do NaNo (the forum was actually started by NaNoers), so if I don't then I feel completely left out the entire month. .... I don't know.

Sorry to be a downer. *cheers everyone*

 

[Lord_Steve]

Lord Steve, if Literotica had a "Like" button, I would like every single one of your posts.

Etoile, if life had a "deify" button all across the world ceremonial fires would be wafting burnt offerings to your delicate nose on old Olympus as we speak.

lmao look at how weirdly put together that sentence was. you said you don't read fiction? tsk tsk, we will teach you to learn and learn together!

 

[marieR19]

a valid criticism of my grandiose claim, to be sure, and I certainly don't begrudge your professor/writer friend his opinion.

the issue, i feel, is one of signal/noise ratio. for every writer who finds their honest muse in the attempt there seem to be twenty nascent steampunk/sci-fi/fanfiction/enormously boring slice-of-life drama stories being dredged creakily into the open air when they might have better been left to rot in the darkness.

it's an exercise that fails because the it lacks structure beyond the cold mechanical detail of words/day which does nothing to ensure quality and much to discourage it.

again, don't misunderstand me, if you wish to be a writer it is very important to write steadily and not stall, but that self-discipline needs to come from a place of passion and self-honesty if it's going to be useful.

but anyway, i have no rancor towards the participants in nanowrimo and i wish them the best of luck. more people should write for sure, it's only the approach i find problematic.

I've actually seen a lot of non-NaNoers have this opinion, and it confuses me greatly.

First, what's so bad about someone writing some "boring slice-of-life drama" if that's what they feel like writing? Not all novel-writing happens with an eye towards publishing, many people do it just for themselves and maybe to share with friends. So I don't understand the idea that NaNo isn't good because it makes people write "boring" stuff that maybe isn't going to be a bestseller. I sure don't write for publishers.

And lacking structure isn't a bad thing anyways. The NaNo mission-idea has pretty much always been about getting wannabe-writers to actually *write*. Not to be published, not to write something perfect or wonderful, just to *write*.

Like the college student who wants to write an epic thesis but ends up giving it a halfhearted attempt because they are never encouraged, never pointed in a "just do it!" direction. Or the waitress who wants to be a manager but doesn't have the guts to go after that job. *Many* people *want* to write, but they never do. NaNo gives that push, that reason to do it.

Who cares if it's quality writing? It's *fun*, and it's finally getting all of those ideas and thoughts onto paper. And that's the point. Not "let's make a quality writer out of you!".

edit: I passed 16k today. How did I get so ahead when I was flailing so much before? I have no clue.

 

[intothewoods]

a valid criticism of my grandiose claim, to be sure, and I certainly don't begrudge your professor/writer friend his opinion.

the issue, i feel, is one of signal/noise ratio. for every writer who finds their honest muse in the attempt there seem to be twenty nascent steampunk/sci-fi/fanfiction/enormously boring slice-of-life drama stories being dredged creakily into the open air when they might have better been left to rot in the darkness.

it's an exercise that fails because the it lacks structure beyond the cold mechanical detail of words/day which does nothing to ensure quality and much to discourage it.

again, don't misunderstand me, if you wish to be a writer it is very important to write steadily and not stall, but that self-discipline needs to come from a place of passion and self-honesty if it's going to be useful.

but anyway, i have no rancor towards the participants in nanowrimo and i wish them the best of luck. more people should write for sure, it's only the approach i find problematic.

I disagree, and agree with everything marie said. In fact, I have nothing substantive to add, but I'm going to continue my post anyway in the spirit of Nanowrimo.

Let them all write. That doesn't mean they'll all be published or read, and that's okay too. It's a fun exercise, and I don't think one's writing method need be so restrictive.

Even though I'm woefully behind, and I really can't churn out that much per day for a variety of reasons, the act of forcing myself to write daily has been so eye-opening.

 

[FurryFury]

Well said and congrats on the wordage.

I've actually seen a lot of non-NaNoers have this opinion, and it confuses me greatly.

First, what's so bad about someone writing some "boring slice-of-life drama" if that's what they feel like writing? Not all novel-writing happens with an eye towards publishing, many people do it just for themselves and maybe to share with friends. So I don't understand the idea that NaNo isn't good because it makes people write "boring" stuff that maybe isn't going to be a bestseller. I sure don't write for publishers.

And lacking structure isn't a bad thing anyways. The NaNo mission-idea has pretty much always been about getting wannabe-writers to actually *write*. Not to be published, not to write something perfect or wonderful, just to *write*.

Like the college student who wants to write an epic thesis but ends up giving it a halfhearted attempt because they are never encouraged, never pointed in a "just do it!" direction. Or the waitress who wants to be a manager but doesn't have the guts to go after that job. *Many* people *want* to write, but they never do. NaNo gives that push, that reason to do it.

Who cares if it's quality writing? It's *fun*, and it's finally getting all of those ideas and thoughts onto paper. And that's the point. Not "let's make a quality writer out of you!".

edit: I passed 16k today. How did I get so ahead when I was flailing so much before? I have no clue.

 

[JMohegan]

perhaps some of you who are conversant with the role of the jester in western literature will understand why I, the motley'd Fool of this lovely forum, have to stir this particular shit.

NaNoWriMo is a really bad idea, a well-meaning but entirely misguided exercise. Writing, when considered as the simple act of transferring black marks onto a white page in such a way as other members of the same culture can comprehend, is not hard. Writing something that is good or worthwhile is difficult, to the extent that talented and inspired people may spend their whole lives attempting it and failing.

Please, don't take this the wrong way. I encourage you write. Write your brains out, write until your keyboard is bloody, try to be the next Aeschylus or Hemingway or McCarthy or whoever it is that you revere. Just please, please don't try to skip to the end of the process. Educate yourself. Read incandescent and glorious books. Write a hundred awful short stories. Expose your friends to your work at every stage, but only if you trust them to be as brutal as they must.

Start at the beginning, as everybody must. Don't forget that writing is an art older than painting and less forgiving besides. Respect what you are trying to achieve.

oh

and

hey nonny nonny

Seems that you're making a few erroneous assumptions here.

First - the assumption that your notion of that which is "worthwhile" matches everyone else's.

Second - the assumption that you know or understand what other people are "trying to achieve."

About six years ago, my sister was having a very difficult time dealing with a family tragedy. An old ballet school friend suggested that she challenge herself to dance for one half hour every single day, from November 1st to January 2nd, as a way of getting through the holidays without going out of her fucking mind. She took the challenge that year, and has repeated it every year since. Just herself, the music, and unstructured dancing, doors closed, every single day, half an hour.

The year after her first dance challenge, she started taking tap lessons. She also incorporates dance moves into her exercise regimen, year-round.

She's not ever going to make it to the Joffrey, or Broadway, or even reality TV. But that's ok, because that's not why she's dancing.