The Writing Process

Above: Laptops by other names: my Olivetti Lettera 32 and an ever-present Moleskine notebook. Simple writing tools that foster ‘concentration, without interruptions’.

Every writer has their own writing process. These days, it would be assumed you would sit down at a laptop or desktop, open up Word, and let the magic happen. But of course, there are as many processes as there are writers: pen and paper, notepad, laptop, typewriter, voice recorder are some ways of getting words down; and place plays its part: car, beach, forest, café, bedroom, study, park…the list is endless.

Over a fairly short period of time, I found my writing process: a small notebook and longhand. But that came from something else. Back in the mid-naughties, I found myself writing a lot on a typewriter. It was a fairly retro move, but I wanted to experience what other writers and journalists had experienced. I wanted to write ‘deliberately’ perhaps. And I fell in love with it.

I found that what originated on a typewriter, required minimal editing later. Sentences, paragraphs, overall structure, flow, were all thought out in advance. Striking a key meant commitment, ink was going on a page, so more thought went into what was going where and when. The writing felt slower to begin with, but the gains came during the shorter editing process; and then my writing developed and became quicker too – there was no writing anything knowing I could fix it later, but – verb choice particularly – happened then and there; and rhetorical devices—those lovely flourishes that bring writing to life—found their way into my writing as I wrote it. I became a better writer.

But, for someone who spends a lot of time writing on a beach, and writing while away on motorcycle trips, typewriters are impractical. They also bring a large dose of self-consciousness because they are unusual in today’s digital world. They draw attention and are noisy. I remember one evening, writing on the balcony of a holiday apartment in Byron Bay when a young couple walked past on the street below and stood laughing and bewildered because they could hear somebody typing on a typewriter. I froze, and then retreated indoors to less solitude but a less judgemental environment too.

What worked for me was a small Moleskine ‘Cahier’ notebook and a gel pen. I have long been a fan of Moleskine notebooks and the Cahier series are classic work-a-day notebooks. The small size fits comfortably in the front pocket of my motorbike jacket, or in the back pocket of my jeans, and in the calico bag which takes up no space in my motorbike luggage and which I use to carry useful things down to the beach when I’m away. While a fountain pen remains my pen of choice, a Uni-Ball gel pen—first bought by necessity from a newsagent in Forster when I had oddly forgotten to bring a pen on a writing trip—proved itself so admirably on that one particular venture that it has become my go-to pen when I am on the road.

Like a typewriter, writing in longhand forced me to think about my sentences, paragraphs, structure, and style. I have a strange ego associated with editing: if I need to edit excessively, to rewrite extensively—and yes, editing does improve our writing—but if it goes beyond what is reasonable in my mind, it soon transforms into frustration which leads to a questioning of my abilities and of what I was trying to write in the first place.

And, like a typewriter, writing in longhand brought minimal editing. When I compare what I have written in my notebooks to what makes it to publishing, I have determined that I am about 90 per cent there in my notebook. When I write directly to my laptop, it never ends; I write and edit as I go, I shift paragraphs around, delete, change fonts and line spacings, and become distracted by checking emails and social media, searching the internet, and generally wasting time. When I write in longhand—or on a typewriter—I just write.

The process

So, what is my writing process? Time and place are important. Setting aside time is best but I often find it coming on first: an idea will appear, sentences will form in my head, a structure will blossom, and I reach for my pen and notebook – I carry one with me everywhere (again why small notebooks are excellent). A good example is from last week: I could feel an idea coming quickly, I had a 10-minute tea break due at the shop I occasionally work in; I took my break and soon had two pages of a story that will likely make this writing blog.

That’s an example of spontaneity, but my technical process is:

• I find and dedicate time to write

• I write out the story in longhand into a small notebook

• At some stage later, I will type the story into a Word document—making some slight and obvious edits as I go. If this follows a time away, it can require finding significant time itself

• I then let it sit for a day or two. It’s always good to leave it and come back with fresh eyes

• Those fresh eyes reveal surprisingly obvious edits that need to be made and omissions that need to be added. I do those

• I then upload it to my blog or paste it into a larger project.

Writing trips

Something I have come to value are writing trips. I alluded to this earlier, and for me, they usually involve several days away on my motorbike either camping or staying in a small cabin. They are times of solitude, fuelled by long days on empty beaches and broken only by trips to the shops or a retreat from the sun.

Above: The freedom and timelessness of being in nature, of having ‘the whole sky to fly in’. On a lonely beach, coffee brewing, sun rising, and ready to write.

They are times of uninterrupted thinking, where the overarching purpose is to write; the secondary purpose—which is so intrinsically linked to the first that it is difficult to separate—is being in nature. There is a freedom to being in nature, a timelessness I don’t feel anywhere else. There is a restriction when writing elsewhere—even at home—a sense of an impending interruption, a need to be somewhere else, other work that needs doing – yes, these are all the selfish qualities of a writer, but they represent the pressures that writers and artists don’t always respond well to. But having those open-ended days in nature are just magnificent! Days that can be devoted to your craft.

Mary Oliver said, ‘Creative work needs solitude. It needs concentration, without interruptions. It needs the whole sky to fly in, and no eye watching…’* Never do those words make more sense to me than when I am alone on a beach, pen and notebook in hand, coffee brewing on my small metho hiking stove, and the day awakening before me, a day when I have nothing to do but smile – and write.

Processes are personal but common among them all is time. Find time, make time, carve out time; create a writing place and spend time in it. That time and that place are what you will associate with writing, and great things will come from being there.

A final note on familiarity

I have referred to such things as typewriters, pens, notebooks, and places, and even broader concepts like writing trips—which include said notebooks and pens—because association born from familiarity is important to the craft of writing. When I go away on my motorbike, I go away to write. A motorbike laden with panniers, my swag, and some camping gear means I am going away to write. Sometimes I am tempted to drive so I can take my surfboards and a guitar, but I know that my time will then be divided between surfing (usually best first thing in the morning, which is also my preferred writing time) and writing songs. Writing will become another player in a crowded competition where the prize is time. So when I go away to write, I go away to write – without interruptions.

I have written before of my reading place; it is where I like to read – and write. I have a study too, and that is where the final work is done. All are important stages of my writing process. The familiarity of our tools, the where and the when, are all part of that process, and all are conducive to good writing.

So, what is your writing process?

Appendix

What I use: an Olivetti Lettera 32

Above: Ready to write

I first heard of the Olivetti Lettera 32 when reading River of Time, Jon Swain’s excellent memoir of his time as a journalist in Vietnam and Cambodia in the early 1970s. ‘I brought to Phnom Penh next to no clothes but a few books and the usual immutable paraphernalia of the journalist in those days – an Olivetti Lettera 32 portable typewriter and a camera,’ he wrote*.

As a budding photojournalist making his own forays into Southeast Asia—and Africa—and enamoured by the rich archive of material created by Swain and his contemporaries as they reported on the conflicts in Vietnam, Cambodia, and Laos, I was intrigued.

Before long, I had my own Lettera 32, bought from an older couple whose typewriter repair business was fast becoming obsolete and would soon follow them into retirement. I immediately fell for the sea foam green colour, and the contrasting red tab key which sometimes gets mistakenly struck as my muscle memory sends my fingers for the ‘return’ key or apostrophe. My Lettera 32 was made in Olivetti’s Barcelona plant; a serial number search puts its year of manufacture at 1970 – it’s the same age as me and I find something special in that.

Other research revealed how correct Swain was: the Lettera 32 being a favourite portable typewriter of its time, adored by journalists and students alike, and also by writers including Cormac McCarthy (All the Pretty Horses, No Country for Old Men, The Road) who allegedly wrote all of his work on the same machine he’d bought in the mid-60s.

Above: Simple and uncluttered. You can write, or you can write.

Continuing research since has shown that many serious writers prefer typewriters to computers—for the reasons outlined in the article above—and that many younger writers are finding something special in the clack and clatter of the keys, and the more direct and immediate connection to their writing.

As a photographer who doggedly resisted moving to digital, and who stubbornly stood at countless airport x-ray machines while security staff sifted through every roll of Ilford HP5 and Fuji Press 400 I could carry, an Olivetti Lettera 32 suited me and my Luddite ways down to the ground.

I have always resisted change-for-change’s sake and the misguided belief that newer must be better. Newer usually means more convenience—at least until you need to upgrade within months of purchase—not higher quality. The things we pay for now are not things designed to last, that stand the test of time, but rather mediocre things created and sold and superseded at an absurd rate.

I have upgraded my computer several times since I bought my Olivetti. Failing batteries and unsupported outdated software render the older machines obsolete. Hard drives litter my desk drawers and a nagging sense that I have lost much material litters my conscience. That I can sit down at a machine as old as I am and write story after story, article after article, or book after book if I wanted to, is testament to both quality (in design and build) and simplicity. And I have an immediate hard copy that can be filed away next my notebooks.

It takes time to learn how to write well, and that time shouldn’t be hindered by never-ending upgrades and endless adjustments and distractions. Sometimes, slipping a piece of paper into a typewriter, or reaching for a pen and notebook is all you need to fly in the whole sky.

This article was written on an Olivetti Lettera 32. It remains largely unchanged from the original draft.

* Upstream, Oliver, M. (2016) Penguin Books p.23
*River of Time, Swain, J. (1995) Berkley Books p.14