Tuesday, September 22, 2009

Now I Can Write Just One Page And Feel Good About It

I've been feeling so much better about work since I read Writing in the Age of Distraction by Cory Doctorow because he suggests setting modest daily goals, "usually a page or two." Ah, yes. A page or two. Or, mainly, a page.

You know what else made me feel good? Reading Roald Dahl's Widow, Liccy, Recalls Her Life With The Real BFG because she says he started work around "10-10:30ish." On a real good day, I start around 10:30ish.

Tuesdays are always a short day for me, so today I didn't start working until well after one. Maybe two, even. Twoish. But I wrote a very satisfactory page and came up with the ending for the story I've been plugging away at for a few weeks.

But I wouldn't be feeling anywhere near as good about that as I am, if I hadn't read those two articles.

2 comments:

Sam said...

I remember reading a few Roals Dahl short stories which he said he wrote in a month each or something like that.

As good as the stories were, I couldn't help but wonder where the time had gone.

Gail Gauthier said...

Well, you know, if you start working around 10:30ish and you only do a page or two a day...

I read Dahl's short stories long before I was exposed to his kids' books (mostly from audio books and movies). I like his short stories much better than his children's books.