Jonathan Franzen on writing sequentially
Jonathan Franzen, in an interview with David Perell, discussed how he writes sequentially. He often produces approximately one new page in a day of work. During his work day, he makes sure the previous day's page is rock-solid, then writes the best next page he can. Whenever he's working on some part of a novel, then, "there's an iron bridge up to that point."
You don’t often hear this. Much more often, people talk about how they have ideas here and there, flesh things out as they can, and put things together later. Yet I suspect the Franzen technique is underrated, even if many great writers don't and shouldn't follow it. It's useful for me, at least. I get antsy when I think that a draft up to a given point is not really legitimate.
There are at least two advantages to the Franzen style. First, what you're writing depends on what comes before it; that's just how reading works. (Also how logic works.) Even "fill in citation" notes bother me; I could after all be wrong about the citation. The metaphor of a bridge or tower rings true for a reason.
Second, working in order mitigates some zero-output problems. If I'm writing without knowing how to get to what I'm writing in a narrative--how to earn it--I often find, later, that neither I nor a reader has any real use for it.
Here's Ted Gioia's wonderful discussion of note-taking. One key excerpt:
I taught myself how to write down everything in coherent complete sentences and integrated paragraphs. I learned how to do this in real time while the professor was speaking.
This fits my experience of taking notes and trying to learn from them later. Writing down a proper, complete thought pays off. (Of course, "complete" does not mean "perfect.") Conversely, I have many notebooks filled with jots and phrases that have been of literally zero value to me after I wrote them.1
So when you're taking notes, be willing to trade off plenty of quantity in order to organize and express a thought properly. You might be surprised at how little a tradeoff there is. And the next time you don't know where to start writing, try starting at the start.
I can hear some people saying: "Yes, but they're of value while you write them." Maybe so, and maybe especially so for other people. As always, though, compare against alternatives. The supposed advantages of jotted notes often, I suspect, apply even more to complete-thought notes.↩