I recently read a couple of articles on writing, both of which sound quite disparate and complex but essentially point to t he same concept.
One was on an attempt to map and compare brain functioning of ‘full time writers’ and ‘novice writers’ who were actively engaged in writing creatively. This piece claims that there are similarities between the brain activities of professional writers and professional athletes; specifically, activity in the caudate nucleus - an area that is used when engaging in activities learned through practice.
Now this (to a non brain specialist) sounds perfectly sensible. Of course it’s an activity learned through training and practice. If there’s an area in the brain specializing in that, you bet it’s going to come into play.
The other was a piece promoting ‘how to write faster.’ Attractive, eh? Wouldn’t we all like to. Ahem, faster and better, to be precise. It’s a bit of an advert for Scrivener, but it has valid points. It lists four problems it claims lead to ‘Slow Writitis’: confusion, perfectionism, overwriting, and doubts. You can read the original here, but think about it.
Perfectionism and doubts are both addressed by more expertise and knowledge. In other words, practice. Confusion (not plotting properly, they mean) and overwriting are also addressed by more expertise and knowledge. You’ve got to have failed a lot to know how much plot you can fit into X number of words, or how much detail is necessary for a certain effect. Like driving a car, it takes experience (quite a lot in my case) to judge how long it will take another vehicle to intersect your path from a given point in the distance, given traffic conditions and the speed of both vehicles involved. It’s not so different from plotting a story.
Both pieces reinforce the fact that writing a coherent narrative isn’t a case of sitting and allowing the creative genius to flow forth naturally. It might seem like that when all the calculations of how fast your plot is going to smack you in the face, and how much throttle you want to give a particular character are aligned from the start and you know where you’re going. But you need practice for that, and you need to be jolly alert. All the time. Just like driving. And while it can certainly be fun, it’s also bloody hard work. You can pedal a bicycle gently at any time in your life provided you’ve learned the basic skill, but if you want to win the Tour de France you’d better practice constantly or you haven’t got a prayer.
I’d better get back to my stories.