Write Time: Guide to the Creative Process, from Vision through Revision—and Beyond
Kenneth Atchityamazon.com
Write Time: Guide to the Creative Process, from Vision through Revision—and Beyond
The glue that holds everything together is the fluid constancy of the mind, technically expressed through “linkage.” Techniques like this one translate that constant mental energy into the external materials of the craft: tricks of the trade.
Kenneth Atchity • Write Time: Guide to the Creative Process, from Vision through Revision—and Beyond
Writing is like sex; you don’t have to wait until you’re an expert to begin doing it. —Student in a UCLA Writers’ Program class
Kenneth Atchity • Write Time: Guide to the Creative Process, from Vision through Revision—and Beyond
Beauty and elevation flash from the currents set up by intense speculation. Beauty is not the aim of the writer. His aim must be truth. But beauty and elevation shine out of him while he is on the quest. His mind is on the problem; and as he unravels it, and displays it, he communicates his own spirit, as it were incidentally, as it were unwittingl
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The revision process should begin after some time has passed, because time will do more for the revision than any amount of conscious attention given too soon. Go away from the draft for as long as you can afford to—take a vacation—and when you come back most of your work will be done for you in the back country of the islands.
Kenneth Atchity • Write Time: Guide to the Creative Process, from Vision through Revision—and Beyond
If the way to write is to let first drafts sit for a vacation-length amount of time, then would he recommend writing only first drafts for, say, seven days straight (seven different essays) before going back to revise the first one?
Richard Lanham’s Revising Prose and Bruce Ross-Larson’s Edit Yourself are the best books I know of that actually take you through the steps of self-editing until you can master the skill yourself.
Kenneth Atchity • Write Time: Guide to the Creative Process, from Vision through Revision—and Beyond
Contraction and Last Time come into play as you see time running out in the interview. That’s when you ask the pointed questions that haven’t yet been answered, and when you give the visionary the opportunity to make an eloquent closing statement. Interviewing isn’t an exact science and it is a science that improves with practice. The most importan
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Whether you name the splits in your consciousness “right brain” and “left brain,” “id” or “ego,” “superego” or “libido,” “father” and “daughter,” “mother” and “son,” “self” or “society,” “intuitive” and “rational,” what’s important to recognize is that we’re working with a divided mind. Non-artists cope with the pressures of division by allowing on
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Your first interview, of course, will take longest with probably least satisfactory response (although beginner’s luck may work for you here). But don’t let that upset you; the individual interview will follow its own laws of time, so structure it to take advantage of this inevitability.
Kenneth Atchity • Write Time: Guide to the Creative Process, from Vision through Revision—and Beyond
"First Time" – the fact that new things take longer – relates to that advice first-time founders are given about pitching investors. They recommend pitching less important/likely-to-invest VCs first so you can make all your mistakes with less risk. I always interpreted this as scarcity thinking, or fear-driven thinking, a criticism of the founder's ability. But that view paints over the fact that First Time is a real thing we ought to respect. The real danger in ignoring this advice and going straight after your top VC is not that you are more likely to fuck it up and lose the chance to win their investment, it's that you'll experience the negative reinforcing effects that come from not honouring First Time and will mistakenly belief you're not up to the job at all.
Even thinking takes time. Some people spend much of their active lives daydreaming, without living to see their dreams come true. Examine the attitude you have toward your own thinking. Even a person who can think of twelve things at a time can still only think of twelve things at a time. Which means that thinking about the negative things, the glo
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