4 ms·

Has anyone just farted around self published books or fanfic a bit? Let me tell you: there's a lot of writing that is nearly unreadable. Sure, you can do it. I

Has anyone just farted around self published books or fanfic a bit? Let me tell you: there's a lot of writing that is nearly unreadable. Sure, you can do it. It's probably best written down and then gently carried over to the archives, only taken out for a good laugh down the road. Writing well is like programming. You have to spend some time doing it before its really ready for public consumption. Then you get to be educated in how the sausage is made and then you have a start. The marathon example is a good one. You need to put in preparation, work, training, sweat, and then you can do the finished product. Writers have workshops and critiquing circles. They have editors. Review, review, review. Draft, draft, draft. The author is critiquing the idea that some genius will hike up their skirt and drop out a diamond, which the agent will then pick up and make the genius rich. Takes ten years of sweat to have a 3 minute hit.

pm90 8y ago
> Writers have workshops and critiquing circles. They have editors. Review, review, review. Draft, draft, draft. Sure, that is probably how "professional" writers get good. But we've had good writers before there were all these tools , didn't we? I find it hard to imagine e.g. Bukowski attending a writing workshop. Some people just have the talent. Others are mediocre and get better with effort.
- ghaff 8y ago
  Sure, some people have more natural talent (and upbringing, background, etc.) But I suspect you're underestimating how hard talented people still have to work to produce quality output.
- pnathan 8y ago
  Not to my knowledge. The University Workshop as a reified formal system, yes. But the review and drafting system where you rewrite it yourself and show your friends the work, then rewrite; it has been present for a quite long time. My dim recollection is that it extends into the 1700s in English literature as a thing. I seem to recollect anecdotes of Johnson doing so; Puritan theologian-pastors previewed their ideas in sermons before publishing them. A more learned historian of literature or theology would be able to provide hard accounts here. As a general remark, the outsider as genius in full flower springing out of Zeus' forehead is astonishingly rare, and should never be taken to be normative or as an ideal to aspire to. This an ancient principle: there is no royal road to geometry.
grecy 8y ago
> Has anyone just farted around self published books or fanfic a bit? I just published my first print book [1] with Amazon CreateSpace. I learned a heck of a lot technically - I wrote it in LaTeX for ultimate formatting control, then ran it through PanDoc and a bunch of my own scripts to massage the epub how I wanted. CreateSpace make it extremely simple, in all honesty anyone that has used facebook has enough computer skill to publish their own book. I also learned a massive amount about writing, editing and so forth. Each new draft I kept saying it was "almost done", then would spend months re-writing entire chapters and paragraphs. Along the journey I read many fantastic books about how to write, and how to make my stories more engaging. It was an extremely rewarding process. The first time you get a draft copy in your own hands is fantastic - it's staggering and the only thing you can say is "holy sh, it's a real book!" Haha. I'm already working on my next books, and I plan to write for the rest of my life. [1] The Road Chose Me Volume 1: Two years and 40,000 miles from Alaska to Argentina - https://amzn.to/2vo3S3G https://amzn.to/2vo3S3G
- pnathan 8y ago
  I was unclear - I meant as a reader. As a reader, self-published work is, to some episilon (where the writers that fall under that epsilon usually wind up well known exceptions), it's all lousy.

pm90 8y ago

> Writers have workshops and critiquing circles. They have editors. Review, review, review. Draft, draft, draft. Sure, that is probably how "professional" writers get good. But we've had good writers before there were all these tools , didn't we? I find it hard to imagine e.g. Bukowski attending a writing workshop. Some people just have the talent. Others are mediocre and get better with effort.

ghaff 8y ago
Sure, some people have more natural talent (and upbringing, background, etc.) But I suspect you're underestimating how hard talented people still have to work to produce quality output.
pnathan 8y ago
Not to my knowledge. The University Workshop as a reified formal system, yes. But the review and drafting system where you rewrite it yourself and show your friends the work, then rewrite; it has been present for a quite long time. My dim recollection is that it extends into the 1700s in English literature as a thing. I seem to recollect anecdotes of Johnson doing so; Puritan theologian-pastors previewed their ideas in sermons before publishing them. A more learned historian of literature or theology would be able to provide hard accounts here. As a general remark, the outsider as genius in full flower springing out of Zeus' forehead is astonishingly rare, and should never be taken to be normative or as an ideal to aspire to. This an ancient principle: there is no royal road to geometry.

grecy 8y ago

> Has anyone just farted around self published books or fanfic a bit? I just published my first print book [1] with Amazon CreateSpace. I learned a heck of a lot technically - I wrote it in LaTeX for ultimate formatting control, then ran it through PanDoc and a bunch of my own scripts to massage the epub how I wanted. CreateSpace make it extremely simple, in all honesty anyone that has used facebook has enough computer skill to publish their own book. I also learned a massive amount about writing, editing and so forth. Each new draft I kept saying it was "almost done", then would spend months re-writing entire chapters and paragraphs. Along the journey I read many fantastic books about how to write, and how to make my stories more engaging. It was an extremely rewarding process. The first time you get a draft copy in your own hands is fantastic - it's staggering and the only thing you can say is "holy sh, it's a real book!" Haha. I'm already working on my next books, and I plan to write for the rest of my life. [1] The Road Chose Me Volume 1: Two years and 40,000 miles from Alaska to Argentina - https://amzn.to/2vo3S3G https://amzn.to/2vo3S3G

pnathan 8y ago
I was unclear - I meant as a reader. As a reader, self-published work is, to some episilon (where the writers that fall under that epsilon usually wind up well known exceptions), it's all lousy.