trollope

Writing Routines

/ Russell / Leave a comment

Whenever I listen to interviews with authors, I’m always interested to know their writing routines. I think this is of interest to both established and aspiring writers. When you start off with the aim of getting 80,000 to 100,000 words from your brain onto the page, the obvious question is ‘How shall I do it?’

Closely related to this are the questions ‘How many words can I write a day?’ and ‘How long does it take to write a book?’

The writer of commercial fiction is often contracted to publish a book a year. This means he or she may be writing the first draft of one book, while editing another book, and publicising yet another! You may wish to be a commercial genre writer, or you may wish to be more like James Joyce, who spent years on a book (and reportedly could spend a whole day on one sentence). Or Donna Tart, who has written few books, with long gaps in between, but has consistently been critically and commercially successful. What kind of a writer do you want to be?

The first full-length novel I wrote (and it’s one of those novels which will stay in a draw for now) was an historical novel of 140,000 words. It was too long, but I did get a manuscript request from an agent, which suggests it wasn’t awful. During the process of writing this book I learned how best to get words on the page, and what kinds of routine suits me.

During this time, my wife was working shifts at a local hospital, which meant sometimes she would have to start work at 7am. I got into the habit of getting up early with her, and using that time in the morning to write until I had to go to my own job for 9am. I found that I was never more productive than at this time in the morning. Even on days when I had a large block of time in, say, the afternoon, I seemed to lack the flow and clarity I found first thing in the morning.

Thus, my writing routine was set. For some reason, I use a particular lime green cup and saucer on writing mornings, filled with strong black coffee. I wouldn’t call it superstition, but rather there’s something about the ritual of a routine that I’d prefer not to change if it works.

As I learned to rewrite and redraft, I found that this detailed work was best saved for later in the day. Early morning was where I found the creative spark, but not necessarily when I had the keen eye for detail needed for editing.

Famously, Anthony Trollope would write in the mornings before he went to his job at the Post Office. He would write 250 words each 15 minutes. Writing between the hours of 5:30am and 8:30am, that put him at around 3000 words per day. I heard an interview with Linwood Barclay, who during the writing of a recent novel found getting an Uber into town gave him a surprisingly productive time and place for writing. So during the writing of that book, he kept getting Uber rides into town.

I think another reason writers want to know about other writers’ routines is that we are insecure and want to compare ourselves. We ask ourselves the question, ‘Are others writing more than I am?’, or ‘Do other people find it as hard as I do?’ This suggests that no matter how experienced or professional a writer is, there is always a part of them that doesn’t know what they are doing. Creative processes are mysterious. It’s not like changing a bike tyre, or altering your boiler pressure, with step-by-step videos available on youtube.

Whatever you find works, whether it’s early in the morning or late at night, the key is consistency. If you are sporadic, or can’t find a routine, that word count will stay low. If you can get into a habit, even if you write a little at a time, you will be surprised at how the word count goes up and reaches your target.

Salmon in October and Dahlias in June

/ Russell / Leave a comment

Victorian novelists often spoke with a narrator’s voice that was very much the voice of the author. It’s an explicit acknowledgement that the relationship is between a reader and a writer, that although the action will play out between the characters, the hand of the author is not entirely invisible. Dickens opens Our Mutual Friend with the words, “In these times of ours, although concerning the date there is no need to be precise, a boat of dirty and disreputable appearance…” and then sets the scene. A writer now would simply begin “A boat of dirty and disreputable appearance, with two figures in it, floated on the Thames…”

When Anthony Trollope asks the question ‘Can you forgive her?’ in the famous novel of the same name, he asks it not just of his characters, but directly to the reader.

I came across this wonderful paragraph in Trollope’s political novel Phineas Finn, where he begins the chapter with a parliamentary scene, then breaks off and almost sets the story aside to share his reflections on the work of a writer:

The poor fictionist very frequently finds himself to have been wrong in his description of things in general, and is told so, roughly by the critics, and tenderly by the friends of his bosom. He is moved to tell of things of which he omits to learn the nature before he tells of them–as should be done by a strictly honest fictionist. He catches salmon in October; or shoots his partridges in March. His dahlias bloom in June, and his birds sing in the autumn. He opens the opera-houses before Easter, and makes Parliament sit on a Wednesday evening. And then those terrible meshes of the Law! How is a fictionist, in these excited days, to create the needed biting interest without legal difficulties; and how again is he to steer his little bark clear of so many rocks,–when the rocks and the shoals have been purposely arranged to make the taking of a pilot on board a necessity? As to those law meshes, a benevolent pilot will, indeed, now and again give a poor fictionist a helping hand,–not used, however, generally, with much discretion. But from whom is any assistance to come in the august matter of a Cabinet assembly? There can be no such assistance. No man can tell aught but they who will tell nothing. But then, again, there is this safety, that let the story be ever so mistold,–let the fiction be ever so far removed from the truth, no critic short of a Cabinet Minister himself can convict the narrator of error.

Phineas Finn, Chapter 29.

What I like about this is that even a great novelist like Trollope knows there are limitations to a writer’s knowledge and experience, which must be overcome through imagination. We can do all the research possible, but sometimes we simply have to make it up and hope for the best. Both critics and friends will tell us which parts were wrong, and we must take it on the chin.

This passage comes just before Trollope writes the scene of a Cabinet assembly. He seems almost to be saying, ‘Look, I don’t really know how to describe this scene, but the only people who can tell me it’s false are the few people involved in a very particular job role, so I’m going to make it up and I’d like you to go along with it.’

This is, of course, in the context of a book full of authentic, thoughtful and well-researched detail. Trollope knows a lot about his subject matter. But it’s a reminder that part of the job of a writer of fiction is to simply make things up!