writing
read about the topic, buy books on the topic. Explore the adjacent topics. Go one or two steps removed. Explore all the synonyms. Write about the thing. Write about it again. And again. Keep going until every angle of the idea was covered. Be boring . But in doing so, push and prod and explore the edges of the subject.
Do the Boring Thing: Weeknotes #39 — Tom Darlington
A prose writer should state exactly what he feels; or else - and this is often more effective - deliberately understate. But how difficult to persuade young writers of this! So often their impulse is to assume that talking big is the same as talking vigorously. As well suppose that the best way to sing well is to sing loud.
F.L. Lucas, Style
The sound of distant living
A great part of the writer's problem, then, is how to catch the ideas that creep forth in the stillness, like magic mice, from their holes... It pays, I think, to meditate a good deal, both before beginning to write, and at intervals while writing. The process of creation may refuse to be bustled. The writer's reverie with a cigarette by the fire... See more
The sound of distant living
Essays often begin in heartache, something unsettled, but as I follow it, the ache cracks open into something that doesn’t erase the heaviness but makes it breathable. When I write abstractedly about my own heartbreaks, it feel raw, almost indulgent to share. But then come the replies. Sometimes strangers tell me my words had helped them love... See more
maja • too much joy is exactly enough
A question worth asking:
When there is so much on the web, it is easy to fall prey to the impression that this has been done before when you come up with an idea. When this happens, ask: ‘What is my take on this?’
When there is so much on the web, it is easy to fall prey to the impression that this has been done before when you come up with an idea. When this happens, ask: ‘What is my take on this?’
When you write online, there are strong incentives to write prose that is tightly packed with insights and fast moving and a little intense—to catch and hold attention. That can feel limiting. I wonder what is the slowest, calmest piece I could write that would still work?
From henrik karlsson
What I’m in search of is maybe hard to explain in a neat sentence, but, maybe, it’s some sense of resonance. You know when you’re reading and you’re like “Oh, this person is saying this thing I’ve been thinking or feeling forever, but didn’t know how to express in words?” That’s a beautiful feeling when you can see yourself more clearly through... See more
On the value of being a beginner
A writing example: when I look back in my notes I realize so much of what I write about today I was ruminating about 2-3 years ago. I always knew what I was going to say. I just didn’t have the tools, I didn’t have the maturity, I didn’t have the language or sensitivity to beauty to recognize what that was. So much of what I learned was latent,... See more
Nix 🕊 • things that take time
Why do I care about these topics ?
What is it about these topics that’s interesting to me ?
Whatever the answer is, that’s where your writing begins.
You’re just trying to find readers who have the same questions you do.
Which means that the act of writing for a reader is the act of trying to find those answers—those further questions beyond—together.
What is it about these topics that’s interesting to me ?
Whatever the answer is, that’s where your writing begins.
You’re just trying to find readers who have the same questions you do.
Which means that the act of writing for a reader is the act of trying to find those answers—those further questions beyond—together.