Learning a story's language

using our intuitive senses for writing a book

I’ve been working on a new book. Curling up over a notebook in the mornings, blinking sleep from my eyes, carving out and claiming precious time to write. Not a word of this draft has so far made it to the computer screen. Instead I’ve been assembling it word by pen-scratched word, by hand, on paper.

I don’t always write by hand (for example, this Substack post is written by computer) but it’s my preference when drafting a novel. Sure, it may appear to take longer, and it requires the tedious step of transcribing. But it gives this perfectionist space to flow. To be messy. To make notes and skip scenes and write backwards and write forwards. To not see that blinking cursor on the blank white page.

As I am unspooling words-which-are-images-thoughts-and-feelings from numinous, liminal StoryLand onto paper, I find myself thinking a lot about how drafting works. Because I often have this hunch that I’m missing something. In writing this particular story, for example, I have the feeling that I am writing what I think the story should be, which at times deafens me to what it actually is.