Methodologies for writing

This week we are looking at methodologies and how we as writers, do what we do. It is interesting how reluctant writers are to explain what they do, preferring the 19th century Romantic vision of the solitary genius. I put it down to the fact that there is little genuine respect for writing in society which is now predominantly literate. In contrast to music and visual arts, which have definite methods of production, but also highly specialised languages, writing looks egalitarian. It is almost as if we fear that if we, as writers, let our secrets out ‘they’ will all be doing it and we will lose our status as artists, which in the minds of the general populous we are only holding onto by our fingernails anyway. As a result, we often fear to examine our methodologies even for personal growth, something which writing for a higher degree is now challenging.
Writing is probably the most idiosyncratic of all the arts, because of the lack of unified or unified method, and is generally considered unteachable, but as I tell my writing students’, talent is unteachable, technique on the other hand...
So for what it is worth, here is my method for writing a novel, as I don’t write anything else really.

1. Read lots of books and keep reading, don’t stop reading during the whole process!
2. Taking as read that the individual has talent, discipline and a connection to the subconscious as starting points, one starts with an idea. An idea can come from anywhere; the important thing to remember is to be open to ideas and to trust your instincts when they tell you an idea is worth following.
3. Sit with the idea; consider what could be done with it. I take my ideas for long walks, on which I mentally run through several possible plot points, I workshop characters and find out what they like and don’t like. I try to build up a mental idea of the characters and the world they inhabit. These may be easier for some people to do in a journal, but for me this work MUST be done mentally, I don’t start writing until a long time into the process, this is just to engage my subconscious and let it play about with the idea.
4. Once I know that an idea will work, I start to do research, because all my writing takes place in a historical period. (I have a major in History and I enjoy hunting.) I will spend 6 months doing research, seeking out primary and secondary sources, reading history books, reading anything really which will help me tell the story. At one stage, I spent a long time looking at feminist retellings of fairy stories and Jungian interpretations of them to write better women. I try to understand the culture I am writing about, I look at food, music, social structure, and what I can’t find I have to invent using similar cultures from the same period.
5. Write a complete first draft without editing: just get the story down.
6. Edit first draft.
7. Give draft to someone to read.
8. Listen to feed back, go back and read the work again.
9. Rewrite and edit again.
10. Repeat steps 7, 8 and 9.
11. Go back to step 3 and 4, you will either, need more research by this point, or have lost focus and need to regroup and reassess what you want your work to do. I am finding that a journal is now useful by this stage.
12.  Repeat steps 7, 8, and 9.
13. This repeating 7, 8, and 9 can degenerate into a hideous loop, eventually you have to let it go. One way to get out of this loop is to give your work to a professional manuscript reader, such as myself to help you see what isn't working.

And that is how I write a novel. Writing is done, not because you want to write, you have a brilliant idea, or because you are terribly talented, though these things help. Writing is completed because you have the dogged persistence and the hard headedness to sit and do the work day after day, with little immediate feedback and not always a lot of support.  Accessing creativity is the easiest part of the process, the hard bit is turning up to work every day and making your way through  the mountain of words, choosing each one with care to convey precisely what you want, and tell the very specific story you wish to tell.

References
Boyd N, 2009, A creative writing research methodology: new direction, strange loops and tornadoes. Margins and mainstreams: Refereed Conference papers of the 14th Annual AAWP Conference,  AAWP viewed 1st April 2013, http://aawp.org.au/files/Boyd.pdf
Janesick V, 1998, Journal writing as a Qualitive research technique: History, issues and reflections, Annual meeting of the American educational research association San Diego, viewed 1st April 2013, https://ilearn.swin.edu.au/bbcswebdav/pid-3406337-dt-content-rid-309576_4/institution/lilydale_postgraduate_writing/LPW706/modules/6/documents/mod5journalwritingreading2.pdf