Stolen Writing
April 06, 2018

Stephen King says it's important for a writer to also be a reader, and is famous
for reading wherever and whenever he gets a chance, such as while waiting in
lines and before a movie starts. I agree with King, but feel it's equally
important to develop the habit of writing wherever and whenever one gets an
opportunity. The practice of stealing moments to jot down a couple of sentences
builds the writing equivalent of quick-twitch muscle fibers, forcing the writer
to clearly marshal thoughts and get them on paper. Used as a stimulant, time
pressure can be used to improve prose style.

But the words written down in stolen moments can't simply be left on the paper.
To be useful, this practice writing has to be examined to see where it's weak or
where an unclear thought or imprecise word has crept in. These paragraphs,
written while waiting for my car's oil change to finish, were covered in
cross-outs that have been removed in editing. I hope that as I improve in the
practice of stolen writing, the number of cross-outs will decrease.

Learning to write exact first drafts also helps also in the editing. The closer
the words in the rough draft are to their intended meaning, the fewer changes
needed in revision. As with target shooting, the stolen-writing writer's
first-draft slogan should be "Aim small, miss small."

(c) 2018 by Andrew Gudgel 
email: contact [at] andrewgudgel.com