Initial Draft Quotes

I believe the first draft of a book — even a long one — should take no more than three months…Any longer and — for me, at least — the story begins to take on an odd foreign feel, like a dispatch from the Romanian Department of Public Affairs, or something broadcast on high-band shortwave duiring a period of severe sunspot activity.

I've always preferred writing in longhand. I've always written first drafts in longhand.

You should write first drafts as if they will never be shown to anyone.

When you first start writing-and I think it's true for a lot of beginning writers-you're scared to death that if you don't get that sentence right that minute it's never going to show up again. And it isn't. But it doesn't matter-another one will, and it'll probably be better. And I don't mind writing badly for a couple of days because I know I can fix it-and fix it again and again and again, and it will be better.

Particularly in my early days, I did very little rewriting.

I find the most difficult part of writing is to get it down initially because what you have written is usually so terrible that it's disheartening; you don't want to go on. That's what I think is hard - the discouragement that comes from seeing what you have done.

I begin by writing paragraphs that don’t have an immediate relation to a plot. The sound of the story comes first.

You write that first draft really to see how it's going to come out.

I'm not reading what I write when I wrote. It's an unconscious outpouring that's a mess, and it's many, many steps away from anything anyone would want to read. Creating that way seems to generate the most interesting material for me to work with, though.

For the novels I wrote before selling anything, I didn't outline much. I had a vague idea of the story.

I write any sort of rubbish which will cover the main outlines of the story, then I can begin to see it.

In a first draft, I concentrate on moving forward and trying not to panic.

I just focus on getting the first scene right, with a few lines about the overall plot, and then the book grows organically.

When I'm writing the first draft, I'm writing in a very slovenly way: anything to get the outline of the story on paper.

This is all you have to do. Sit down once a day to the novel and start working without internal criticism, without debilitating expectations, without the need to look at your words as if they were already printed and bound. The beginning is only a draft. Drafts are imperfect by definition.

First drafts are for learning what your story is about.

The first sequel thing I wrote was this 'Forever Dawn' thing that will never get out, because it's horrid. But it's a really good outline for 'Breaking Dawn' - it's very similar. I knew what I was doing, which is good, because I think if I hadn't, there might have been a lot of pressure.

Never correct or rewrite until the whole thing is down.

I think too many people edit themselves way too soon. There's plenty of time to edit, and it is a crucial part of it all, too.

I'm a big believer in puking out all your thoughts in a single sitting and getting some version of the work down, because the alternative just prolongs the agony. The first draft is hideous and ajskdlkdfksjdfslfjk, but it's just a map for where the big blocks go.

Don't get it right, just get it written.

Writers are in control of editing processes - making a sentence better, cutting out a paragraph. But the initial outpouring has very little to do with conscious control or manipulation.

The experienced writer says to the anguished novice: 'Just do it; get something, anything, on to the screen or page, just establish a flow of words, and criticise them later.' You give this advice but can't always take it.

The importance to the writer of first writing must be out of all proportion of the actual value of what is written.

I type most of my books for the first chapter or two - I use a manual typewriter for the first 50 pages or so - and then I move to the computer. It helps me keep the work lean so I don't end up spending 10 pages describing a leaf.