NaNoWriMo 2007 - November is the month for writing!

[tzor]

National Novel Writer's Month is a fun, seat-of-your-pants approach to novel writing. Participants begin writing November 1. The goal is to write a 175-page (50,000-word) novel by midnight, November 30.

Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetingly about writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved.

Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output. It's all about quantity, not quality. The kamikaze approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.

Make no mistake: You will be writing a lot of crap. And that's a good thing. By forcing yourself to write so intensely, you are giving yourself permission to make mistakes. To forgo the endless tweaking and editing and just create. To build without tearing down.

As you spend November writing, you can draw comfort from the fact that, all around the world, other National Novel Writing Month participants are going through the same joys and sorrows of producing the Great Frantic Novel. Wrimos meet throughout the month to offer encouragement, commiseration, and—when the thing is done—the kind of raucous celebrations that tend to frighten animals and small children.

In 2006, we had over 79,000 participants. Nearly 13,000 of them crossed the 50k finish line by the midnight deadline, entering into the annals of NaNoWriMo superstardom forever. They started the month as auto mechanics, out-of-work actors, and middle school English teachers. They walked away novelists.

So, to recap:

What: Writing one 50,000-word novel from scratch in a month's time.

Who: You! We can't do this unless we have some other people trying it as well. Let's write laughably awful yet lengthy prose together.

Why: The reasons are endless! To actively participate in one of our era's most enchanting art forms! To write without having to obsess over quality. To be able to make obscure references to passages from our novels at parties. To be able to mock real novelists who dawdle on and on, taking far longer than 30 days to produce their work.

When: Sign-ups begin October 1, 2007. Writing begins November 1. To be added to the official list of winners, you must reach the 50,000-word mark by November 30 at midnight. Once your novel has been verified by our web-based team of robotic word counters, the partying begins.

[Lago_AM3P]

Make no mistake: You will be writing a lot of crap. And that's a good thing. By forcing yourself to write so intensely, you are giving yourself permission to make mistakes. To forgo the endless tweaking and editing and just create. To build without tearing down.

I never understood the point of this.

This project doesn't last long enough for you to produce your best effort yet requires just enough time and effort so you can't write something off of the seat of your pants.

In other words you don't have enough time to make something great and the hurdle is too high to make something fun.

Sounds like a hoot and a half.

Who: You! We can't do this unless we have some other people trying it as well. Let's write laughably awful yet lengthy prose together.

We said the same thing about fanfiction.net and look how puerile that den of congratulatory self-parody is. Of course, most of these people are preteens who dream about sucking Sephiroth's nipples. I don't know what this organization's excuse is.

[erik]

Man, writing a 50,000 word novel just about sucking Sephiroth's nipples sounds like a challenge.

I imagine the trick to all this is that to be a writer you really need to just start writing. Write a crappy novel and learn from your mistakes... and more importantly learn how to start writing. Once you learn how to kick that into gear everything else flows much more smoothly.

[CalibronXXX]

It forces procrastinators, like me, to actually produce something instead of just thinking about it. It breaks bad habits and opens the flood gates of artistic creation. Possibly it also builds confidence and improves liver function.

[tzor]

He stared blankly at the screen, the vast expanse of white surrounded by small images in various shades of blue. It seemed like a vast void, a great expanse of nothingness in which any item placed therein would become hopelessly lost.

“What are you doing,” she asked after watching him for what appeared to be several minutes of acting like a deer in the headlights.

“I have to make a defense of NaNoWriMo,” he replied off hand. “I don’t know where to begin.”

She laughed. “Just tell them you write like an idiot for a whole month and feel better for the rest of the year.”

“But how do I start that?”

“Just do it like you start everything,” she insisted.

Exactly! He knew the way he always started everything. It was so simple, yet so brilliant. Placing his fingers on the keyboard he began to type, “It was a dark and stormy night.”

Yes, even after all those years Lucy still knew how to bring out the writer in the old mut.

[CalibronXXX]

Awesome.

[Lago_AM3P]

He stared blankly at the screen, the vast expanse of white surrounded by small images in various shades of blue. It seemed like a vast void, a great expanse of nothingness in which any item placed therein would become hopelessly lost.

“What are you doing,” she asked after watching him for what appeared to be several minutes of acting like a deer in the headlights.

“I have to make a defense of NaNoWriMo,” he replied off hand. “I don’t know where to begin.”

She laughed. “Just tell them you write like an idiot for a whole month and feel better for the rest of the year.”

“But how do I start that?”

“Just do it like you start everything,” she insisted.

Exactly! He knew the way he always started everything. It was so simple, yet so brilliant. Placing his fingers on the keyboard he began to type, “It was a dark and stormy night.”

Yes, even after all those years Lucy still knew how to bring out the writer in the old mut.

That's barely a half of a page.

Now do the equivalent effort 349 more times in one month.

My point is that the time limit/length do not match up. Writing 50 pages in one month is more doable, would accomplish the same goal, and people would probably churn out stuff of more quality.

People just do not write quality stuff in one month unless they're some sort of prodigy or they had material brewing in their heads for quite some time. And that's cheating.

[Lago_AM3P]

Man, writing a 50,000 word novel just about sucking Sephiroth's nipples sounds like a challenge.

No, it's not, actually.

Just as Marquis de Sade can write entire novels about how he gets off on peasant girls getting raped, people in fanfiction.net can easily write 50,000 words on how much the Sailor Scouts want to bathe in the healing glow of David Gonterman's bombass dick.

I used to be a MSTer and I know it's not hard or profiting or even amusing. Don't question me on this.

[erik]

1191523594[/unixtime]]

People just do not write quality stuff in one month unless they're some sort of prodigy or they had material brewing in their heads for quite some time. And that's cheating.

Cheaters for the win?

Most folk who would even remotely consider this either enjoy writing for the sake of writing, or have had stuff fermenting in their noggin for a while.

Hell, I've got more than a few stories that I want to write, but never find the time. If I can finish my current RPG project in October, then I'll possibly take a swing at one of my writing projects in November. I'd be happy just to get at least one of those stories out of my head.

[CalibronXXX]

What's an MSTer?

[tzor]

1191523594[/unixtime]]That's barely a half of a page.

Now do the equivalent effort 349 more times in one month.

I did, three times in total, and the last two were successful. It's not all that hard, mind you, once you get on a roll the stuff keeps comming and comming. In fact if you get on a roll the characters start forming a queue waving their ideas for plot points that you don't need for another three chapters. And how can you say no to a female hobbit druid who was the equivalent of Dr. Ruth (2005) or a female military officer who could turn into a penguin (2006)?

My biggest problem was dialogue abuse, which was why, oddly enough, Script Frenzy this year was a breeze. I'm going to stop and describe the flowers for this novel.

[Lago_AM3P]

My biggest problem was dialogue abuse, which was why, oddly enough, Script Frenzy this year was a breeze. I'm going to stop and describe the flowers for this novel.

They should call this 'Assing Around with Absurdism' Month rather than a title that suggests the tiniest smidgeon of literary excellence.

Unless they were going for irony. But the title isn't really all that ironic.

[JonSetanta]

Somehow I accomplished this before, with the Fey by Sig document. Then again I was half-sane, withdrawing from heavy painkillers.
Don't think I will willingly do that kind of fervent typing again; it's a physical and mental strain.
Well, unless I got paid for it...