Lately I've noticed some writers tweeting about writing their stories by hand, and that made me curious. I definitely like the idea of sitting down with paper and a pen, which always makes me feel so much closer to my writing and the words--much closer than I feel when typing at a computer.
That being said, I type more often than I write by hand. My problem--and I've heard others express this same issue--is that my thoughts flow much more quickly than my hand can keep up. As a result, my writing, which is normally neat, grows sloppy and difficult to read, and afterward, I find myself struggling to decipher what I had written. Using a pen and paper slows down my progress; typing does not.
Still, I do use pen and paper occasionally. I love sitting in coffee shops with my notebook, people-watching and--I admit--eavesdropping on the conversations around me. When I visited New York City for the first time, writing in Starbucks, trite as the idea may seem, was one of the first things I wanted to do, and I did it. For some reason, I felt more like a writer that day.
How do you write best?
I always do pen and paper. I just can't do it on a computer screen. I don't know if it's the glaring screen itself or the fact that typing = work to me which automatically shuts off my brain. But the words flow once I have a pen in hand. Even when I edit I print off pages, do it manually and then type the changes back in.
ReplyDeleteThe only crappy part is typing all of that wording in. That takes days depending on how much I've written.
I edit the same way you do because I can't look at the computer screen for the long periods of time it takes to edit. My eyes get tired, and I find that I miss too much. Working with the hard copy works better for me.
ReplyDeleteI love that you use pen and paper to write! Most of the people I've talked to about this use the computer. I would love to handwrite, if only I could guarantee that I could read my writing later!