Quote: awrigley, Monday, 29 Mar 2010 15:20Quote: sophiemp, Monday, 29 Mar 2010 13:55...I've always thought we should write what we write and let someone else label it if they must.
Patti
I have a sneaking admiration for people who can write to order. [Akin, almost, to being able to fart to order, something my great aunt Millicent could allegedly do effortlessly].
I mean, who could possibly write the script for Eastenders (UK soap about Londoners)? It must have something to do with having a mortgage and working as part of a production team, with deadlines and such.
Do editorial deadlines spoilt any of the fun of writing? I suspect I would take up painting again.
Andrew
Editorial deadlines spoil ALL the fun of writing.
No, actually that's not true. The writing is still fun. What's spoiled is all the time you're NOT writing, because whatever else you're doing, you feel like you
should be writing, and you're worrying about the deadline.
I'm lucky to have an editor who puts no pressure at all on me. But then, she doesn't have to, because I do it to myself.
I admire people who can do it, too. I'm not one of them, and I don't expect I ever will be. Just as well I'm not one of those people who wants to give up my day job.
I always said that if writing stopped being fun, I would stop doing it. I'm confident that it won't stop being fun, and what I will stop doing is signing contracts before I have a completed draft.
But this is just me. I know other people who have contracts and deadlines and aren't at all bothered by them.