Very hard.

Steven

I had a spell, summer before last, when I wrote 2000 words a day for around a month. It was wonderful, but it's never happened before or since. Winterson is some kind of new literary genetic mutant, or something, (and I mean that in a nice way; no libel intended )

Right now, it's write three words. Make cup of tea. Write two words. Spend hour on internet. I am a slug.

Wax, Your parents were Scientologists?! How was that? When I read some of Hubbard's stuff about it, it just sounded like a lot of counselling with a bit of NLP thrown in. Is it?

I love the Joyce anecdote.

I saw an article about the working hours of various authors a while ago, and I kept it. If I can find it, I'll tell you all about Rose Tremain and others.

Sharon

Scientologists! Something Wicked This Way Comes!

Sharon, have you tried coffee? It may boost your word output? If I'm ever having a bad writing day, I make a big mug of coffee and ride a caffeine high. It's not too long until the words start to flow again.

Steven

Good, isn't it, that Winterton can write for 16 hours a day? Perhaps she has more than 24 of them in any one day, somehow. I otherwise can't quite figure out how she has time to do the healthy organic food eating, or the drinking of the bottle of wine, bless her, that she mentioned in the article before her 16 hour claim. Unless she's inclined to get maths mixed up from time to time, and really meant 16 minutes.
Becca.

Dav, thanks for the Scientology lesson. Although it did induce a shivering reaction. The phrase, "stay away from me you f*****g freaks!", springs to mind. There's nothing more scary than religious smiling people. *shudders*

They always remind me of the bodysnatched, from Invasion Of The Bodysnatchers. You could throw a couple of Scientologists in your Nazi Horde novel, would make it EVEN scarier!

No wonder that Hubbard guy could write so many words. [con men are so full of it] Bullshit, that is. Please, I'm going to have religious nightmares now! Christ, I bet some of my neighbours are Scientologists, they'll be throwing doctrines at me any minute! What if they start chanting things through my letter box while I'm sleeping

Thanks for the tip, Steven, but I'm definitely a decaf girl. I have enough trouble sitting still as it is.
Sharon

I'd get the DT's if I switched to decaf. I'd be like Ray Milland in The Lost Weekend.

Steven

Come to think of it, I did hear a strange noise last night... lol

Becca, on the subject of La Winterson's claim, perhaps, like Mrs T, she simply doesn't sleep much. I've always really envied people like Thatcher who can fire on all cylinders after only four hours sleep. I need eight or nine hours, but whilst I was working in the City rarely got them and was permanently knackered. But if I could get by on four, I would have much less of an excuse for hardly ever completing my daily to-do list.

Back to the prodigious Ms Winterson, she claims to have written the book that made her name, Oranges are not the only Fruit, in only six weeks, and, James, her Christian fundamentalist parents proved to be a great source of literary material. Also, John Le Carre` said that he also wrote his first bestseller Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy in six weeks, whilst in a fugue state. Oh for that blast of inspiration and the energy to do that!

Wishing you all a productive day,

Adele.

<Added>

P.S. Le Carre`'s first draft was about 110,000 words, but he late cut that back to about 65,000.

Adele, what's a fugue state, and how can I get into one?
And is it legal? It sounds quite funky.

Steven

Steven, quite legal, and in Le Carre`s case, not brought on by any exotic substances, or none that he admitted to in the Desert Island Discs programme when he said this. According to the OED a fugue state is:

a state or period of loss of awareness of one's identity, often coupled with flight from one's usual environment, associated with certain forms of hysteria and epilepsy.

Must try and work myself into one now. Well, after I've read the papers...

Adele, that description of a fugue state sounds just like the plot for Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy. Isn't that about a civil servant who becomes a spy, or deluded into some covert operation?
I want to see the Alec Guinness TV series that was done in the 80's. I'll read the book first though, sounds interesting and unique. Another book to add to the list.

I don't suppose it's hard in our society today for people to loose one's identity amongst the myraid of media endorsements telling us what to wear, eat and how to think and behave. Damn, I must stop watching television! - I do find BBC News 24 quite frightening with it's Third Reich colour scheme. Has anyone esle noticed this, or is it just me?

Steven

To be honest Eyeball, I see any organised religion as a bit of a crutch. I'm not a scientologist myself, but obviously have had experience of it being raised in a 'care' school until I was about 11. It wasn't terrific as you'd imagine.

I think reading and stuff has given me a wider scope than my parents. They find an answer to everything in Hubbard's writing, whereas I have read some, but it doesn't really gel with my world view.

Whichever way you look at it though, he was instrumental in science fictions 'golden age' and I take all that fictional stuff as entirely seperate from the 'religious' stuff... because it is.

I don't think for one second scientologists mean any harm though, it's just they are very 'fervent' in their beliefs. Individuals are individuals, just like you get good and bad christians, muslims, whatever...

They are my folks, and of course, I love them very much, so it's difficult to convey my real feelings about their beliefs to them. We've argued points in the past, now it's better to just leave them to it.

I'm not one to knock someone else's beliefs, unlike some people, who cannot wait to let rip with their prejudices. I'm not into bigotry or propaganda in any form, but then I guess I've seen enough to know what can happen. I grew up under apartheid. I've seen first hand the results of discrimination. It aint for me.

As writer's, I think it's imperative to remain open minded in order to absorb the world.

Religions we don't understand or accept? It's just one more thing to persecute at the end of the day. I wonder if people said the same things about the Jews forty odd years ago?

I'm not defending any religion, but neither do I damn them, because at the end of the day, who really knows the truth?

JB

Bob Penny seems to know the truth as he used to be a scientologist, but luckilly came to his senses. He's written a very interesting article on the cult of scientology. Well worth a read:

A New Face of Evil
http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~dst/Library/Shelf/wakefield/us-a2.html?FACTNet

Although I do wish I'd never read it. VERY frightening stuff. A cult posing as a relgious group, very scary!

It makes fascinating reading, though a little disturbing to think that these kind of people are out in society.

Steven

So in terms of how hard writers work in here, do people have a strict word count that they stick to each day?

I usually go for a 1,000, but any more is always a surprise when it happens.

Steven