Comments on: Outlining v winging it

By: Zyanas

Zyanas — Thu, 18 Dec 2008 00:19:21 +0000

I must have an outline. It is not a matter of comfort, it is a matter of survival. Not even I can make sense of my own first draft without an outline. This is largely do to the fact that I don’t tend to think in a chronological or linear manner. If I tried seat-of-my-pants, I’d wind up with scene forty seven occurring suddenly in the middle of a sentence that belongs to scene one, placed directly across from scene seven. So I outline like mad, and re-arrange, and get together a list of all the events that need to happen to get from point A to point B to point C to point D in order.
Then I write about point C and then point A, and then point D and point B in unison. When I’ve checked off every scene on my list, rearrange my scenes according to my guideline, and add in the connective tissue. That’s draft one for me.
That said, while writing I do make changes to the outline where I find them necessary. I find changes to the outline necessary a lot. The story I outlined and the story I wrote are often totally different stories by the time draft one is finished.

By: Justine

Justine — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 21:50:27 +0000

Mark: Muse? Ewww. We don't hold with muses around here. Carrie: I have bad news for you. Even though you don't have to outline for your editor doesn't mean you won't wind up having to write one for your agent to use to sell to foreign markets etc. Sad but true. Sarah: I think you NEED to add ninja ponies. Immediately. Lizabelle: Most of the writers I know experience that whether they outline or not. Hmmm, I am full of bad news this morning.

By: Lizabelle

Lizabelle — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 20:50:29 +0000

At the moment, I write by the seat of my pants, but this also means that I lose all confidence in what I’m writing approximately half-way through, making it very difficult to get anything finished. So thanks for this post, because it’s so reassuring to know that other people do this and push on through!

By: Sarah Rees Brennan

Sarah Rees Brennan — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 20:35:26 +0000

I outline, but this is because otherwise, in the midst of fevered writing, I have a Brilliant Idea. This usually involves adding ninjas, or ponies, or ninja ponies.

I do not enjoy outlining, though, and it’s hard for me, so I’d say I’m a you-kind-of-writer driven to Diana’s side by the sad ninja pony addiction.

By: Nicholas Waller

Nicholas Waller — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 15:40:53 +0000

There was an interesting Screenwipe from Charlie Brooker (writer of the "zombietastic" Dead Set) on the BBC last week in which he interviewed various TV writers (notes here) about how they went about writing - Russell T Davies from Doctor Who, the writers of Peep Show, the writer of Father Ted and The IT Crowd and more. One part was about all this - plan vs wing - and one writer says he starts with a blank piece of paper: "With a show like Hustle I just wrote and got to page 55 and now I have 10 pages to explain in flashback how they get out of it. And I swear to you at that stage I have no idea." Russell Davies says "I have an idea in my head, although not in any real order and you slalom your way through it." But another chap says he is a bit of a structuralist and has to have a plan, which "may not be any more than a 1-4 page outline or even a page of bullet points. But there has to be something so when I get stuck and start hyperventilating, I can look at the plan and say ok this comes next, keep writing, keep writing." So they are all the same but different. Part 1 on YouTube here, at least at the moment. Normally Screenwipe is us watching Brooker on the telly watching another telly and criticising what's on it, which accounts for some of the comments. Some of these writers are comedy writers and the commenters also seem to be annoyed that they are not rib-ticklingly hilarious while being interviewed about their working practices.

By: Gabrielle

Gabrielle — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 15:40:39 +0000

I never used to outline; I never used to finish books. I think I personally need an outline to push me forward, since writing isn’t the source of my survival or anything. Knowing what happens next pushes me to get there and actually makes me look forward to it.

By: Carrie Ryan

Carrie Ryan — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 15:31:15 +0000

I’m in your camp Justine — I have NO idea what the book is about until I write it. I like your idea that the writing of the first draft is just building the story on paper rather than in your head!

I think the sweetest news I ever heard was that my editor wasn’t going to require an outline or a synopsis for my unwritten but contracted books. My fingers are crossed this keeps up.

Now I just need to get back to revising that draft on paper. Hmmm, there must be a better word than revising.

By: Mark

Mark — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 15:29:03 +0000

Great post! I think the SOTP (Seat Of The Pants) method results in more innovation as you let your muse direct you to things that never would have occurred in careful plotting. However, too many budding writers look at the large amount of up-front work of plotting and decide they are SOTP’ers with a resultant mess of linear stories, sparse subplots, etc.

NaNoWriMo is a great exercise for this kind of thing. My first year of it I went totally SOTP, starting with a a hero and opening scene and just invented as I went. it was the most exhilarating writing of my life but the result was dreadful. The second year I wanted to keep the potential of free-form plot invention so I plotted out only the big picture and tried to leave the rest up to my subconscious – it was pretty disastrous as the outline restricted me but didn’t give enough to work on. The last year I went like Diana and plotted it all out. The book ended up being much more professional and readable, so I guess I am a plotter – but I do miss the heady wild-west days of SOTP.

By: Diana Peterfreund

Diana Peterfreund — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 14:17:36 +0000

I, for one, am exactly like Nabokov. Great post!

Just to clarify, the plot board is a revising tool. I do it AFTER I’ve written the book. It’s not so very different from the Scrivener corkboard. It’s just a way that I can see if I’ve dropped any plot threads during the actual writing.

I don’t know if I’ve got a clear idea of the *entire* book, but I do have “tent pole” scenes and the idea of vague connective tissue. things do change in the actual writing though. For example, my synopsis for the second you-know-what-with-the-horn book is 6000 words long. the book is projected to be ~100k. Maybe a third of the synop is devoted to discrete scenes, “set pieces” that I know will be in the book. The rest is kind of overview, connective tissue, and “and then some really cool stuff happens, the details of which I will work out later” and I’m not really sure how that works out until I get into the fray.