May 13, 2007
Writing with Stones
What a beautiful stone wall! My family is now lucky enough to have this wall in our back yard. The bloke who built it is obviously a master of his craft.
What does our wall have to do with writing? The answer is to be found in "Weinberg on Writing", a thought-provoking book about how to write using the metaphor of building a fieldstone wall.
Jerry Weinberg addresses the problem of writer's block by showing how metaphorical stones can be continually collected. Each stone may or may not end up as part of a published work. The process of collecting stones typically contributes to ongoing work on a number of potential finished books, articles, reports or even blog entries. The trick is to always be ready to write. Carry a pen and notebook everywhere so that ideas can be readily captured. Later on the stones can be organised, perhaps eventually being crafted together in a finished wall to be admired. Or perhaps not. Stones may be thrown away during the editing process.
I think the Fieldstone Method employs a useful metaphor that keeps the writer productive. Of the many lessons in this book worth heeding my favourite is Jerry's first: "Never attempt to write something you don't care about". After all, a fine stone wall is built by a master craftsman with passion. Writing should be similar.
Posted to Software Development, Writing by Keith PittyI tried to find some way to weave "The writing is on the wall" into this comment, but failed. Or maybe not. Anyway, I think the idea of carrying a notebook for random jottings is a great idea, especially for a commuter like yourself. Are you going to try it?
Posted by: Dave Pinn at May 14, 2007 12:12 AMDave,
Yes, I have been trying it. I have a small notebook that fits into my pocket. And on my laptop I have a few places that I use to jot down ideas for topics as well as embryonic files for writing about those topics. I guess I need to keep practicing. I don't anticipate ever writing published works on the scale that Jerry Weinberg has but he has inspired me to write more.
Posted by: Keith at May 14, 2007 11:34 AMThe trick would be to review your notes every now and then, to let ideas bubble to the surface; otherwise they are just breadcrumbs.
Posted by: Dave Pinn at May 14, 2007 5:15 PMYes, unsurprisingly Weinberg has devoted some of the chapters in his book to organising stones. One exercise he suggests is writing each "stone" on an index card and then shuffling them as in Solitaire. The challenge is to write a piece using the stones in the order they appear. I haven't tried it yet but it sounds like it could be a good exercise.
I'll have to set aside more time to practice writing.
Posted by: Keith at May 14, 2007 11:02 PMAlmost all problems can be solved with a packet of index cards; eXtreme Programming proved it.
Posted by: Dave Pinn at May 15, 2007 12:51 AMIndex cards are useful but I used to enjoy Weetbix cards. We need them back.
And the stonework is beautiful Keith.
Posted by: Neville Harrison at May 15, 2007 9:33 PMGood to see you are still a young boy at heart, Neville! I'm enjoying your writing by the way.
Posted by: Keith at May 16, 2007 12:22 AMhi uncle keith!
i like your website, its very cool
i like the new wall!
Bye!
Posted by: Ellen Barrett at June 21, 2007 7:32 PM