Re:My mother declared my bedroom a disaster area
by vidarh on Thursday April 18, 2024 @11:51PM
(#40083276)
Look up Georges Simenon (Maigret novels). Some people just write fast. Simenon used to write his novels in a week, and that isn't particularly unusual.
It certainly varies with genre, and the short writing periods tend to be more common in genres where people write series and the genre has very specific expectations (e.g. romance, crime mysteries) and where huge levels of originality isn't needed. NOT suggesting that is the case for Tchaikovsky.
I've written two novels, and when I first get myself to sit down and write (that's the hard part), I fairly consistently write 2k words an hour. A 200 page novel is in the 60k-65k word range, so 30-33 hours of writing.
If I could get myself to sit down and just write more consistently, I could churn out a lot too (of course whether it'd be good enough and/or commercial enough is another matter - most authors sell peanuts).
That ability to make themselves sit down and write with some degree of consistency is the most impressive part to me with authors who produce a lot, but that probably reflects what I personally find hardest (my second novel took three weeks from synopsis to first draft, and another four of editing; I'm now two years and 40k words into my third novel despite having planned the plot out in detail)
It certainly varies with genre, and the short writing periods tend to be more common in genres where people write series and the genre has very specific expectations (e.g. romance, crime mysteries) and where huge levels of originality isn't needed. NOT suggesting that is the case for Tchaikovsky.
I've written two novels, and when I first get myself to sit down and write (that's the hard part), I fairly consistently write 2k words an hour. A 200 page novel is in the 60k-65k word range, so 30-33 hours of writing.
If I could get myself to sit down and just write more consistently, I could churn out a lot too (of course whether it'd be good enough and/or commercial enough is another matter - most authors sell peanuts).
That ability to make themselves sit down and write with some degree of consistency is the most impressive part to me with authors who produce a lot, but that probably reflects what I personally find hardest (my second novel took three weeks from synopsis to first draft, and another four of editing; I'm now two years and 40k words into my third novel despite having planned the plot out in detail)