writing
Lots of people worry that AI will replace human writers. But I know something the computer doesn’t know, which is what it feels like inside my head. There is no text, no .jpg, no .csv that contains this information, because it is ineffable. My job is to carve off a sliver of the ineffable, and to eff it.
(William Wordsworth referred to this as... See more
(William Wordsworth referred to this as... See more
Adam Mastroianni • 28 slightly rude notes on writing
Most writing, of course, isn’t exclusive in terms of access, but in terms of time . There’s something special about every word written by a human because they chose to do this thing instead of anything else. Something moved them, irked them, inspired them, possessed them, and then electricity shot everywhere in their brain and then—crucially—they... See more
Adam Mastroianni • 28 slightly rude notes on writing
This is why it’s very difficult to teach people how to write, because first you have to teach them how to care. Or, really, you have to show them how to channel their caring, because they already care a lot, but they don’t know how to turn that into words, or they don’t see why they should.
Adam Mastroianni • 28 slightly rude notes on writing
Here’s my point. Some people think that writing is merely the process of picking the right words and putting them in the right order, like stringing beads onto a necklace. But the power of those words, if there is any, doesn’t live inside the words themselves. On its own, “Love the questions” is nearly meaningless. Those words only come alive when... See more
Adam Mastroianni • 28 slightly rude notes on writing
All emotions are useful for writing except for bitterness .
Good writing requires the consideration of other minds—after all, words only mean something when another mind decodes them. But bitterness can consider only itself. It demands sympathy but refuses to return it, sucks up oxygen and produces only carbon dioxide. It’s like sadness, but stuck... See more
Good writing requires the consideration of other minds—after all, words only mean something when another mind decodes them. But bitterness can consider only itself. It demands sympathy but refuses to return it, sucks up oxygen and produces only carbon dioxide. It’s like sadness, but stuck... See more
28 slightly rude notes on 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