Here’s Chapter 17 from my book Painting the Past: A Guide for Writing Historical Fiction. Enjoy.
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There’s no such thing as writer’s block. If you’re having trouble writing, well, pick up the pen and write. No matter what, keep that hand moving. Writing is really a physical activity.
~Natalie Goldberg
One of the hardest parts about writing historical fiction, or any fiction, or any writing for that matter, is simply getting started.
Inertia is powerful. So many people want to write. So many people say they have a story they feel compelled to tell but they never quite get around to it. I have a friend who has wanted to write mystery novels for as long as I’ve known her. She reads mysteries and she reads books about how to write mysteries. She belongs to Sisters in Crime, a cool group for women crime writers. Yet she hasn’t written anything. When I ask her about her novel, her answer is always, “One day I’ll actually do it.”
Writing is one of those things that’s so easy not to do. Finding the momentum to start a new project can be overwhelmingly difficult. There are no tricks to finding motivation, finding a way past the Excuses, or even sitting down to the computer. In Bird by Bird, Anne Lamott tells a story about Natalie Goldberg, who, when asked what the trick was to writing, mimed writing across a yellow pad. These days you might mime typing your fingers across a keyboard. No matter how you write, that essential truth remains: to write you must write. That’s it. I wish I had some magic formula for writing motivation. If I did I’d bottle it, sell it, and buy the first bottle myself.
I hate writing first drafts. I well and truly hate it. I hate writing first drafts of anything—historical novels, essays, scholarly articles, blog posts, short stories, emails. I have rewritten grocery lists because I didn’t like the way I organized them. When I’m teaching writing I always know what to say to help my students deal with first draft phobias or writer’s block, but do I listen to my own advice? Sometimes—if I’m lucky. There’s a reason why Ernest Hemingway and Anne Lamott refer to them as shitty first drafts. They are, in fact, shit. But as Lamott points out, they must be written or else there is no second, third, or final draft.
Talking myself out of writing a first draft is a particular talent of mine. I fall victim as much as anyone else to those old writers’ standbys known as Excuses. It’s not hard to find plenty of Excuses to keep from working. First draft days are days when I dust and vacuum instead of writing, you know, not regular maintenance house cleaning but vacuuming-behind-the-sofa-where-people-will-never-see kind of cleaning. The days when I brush my cat instead of writing that first draft, or worse, talk to my cat instead of writing that first draft. She doesn’t answer so it’s fine. There are grocery stores to shop in, books to read, classes to teach. I even exercise instead of writing, and I hate exercising. The list of Excuses can be endless.
The first thing you need to examine if you’re stuck is whether or not the writing project you’re working on really gets your creative juices flowing. Ultimately, this is what finally gets me going. I realize that I’m so interested in my subject that I’m able to overcome the inertia and start writing.
Taking time to get your thoughts straight before you start writing can be helpful. Brainstorming and prewriting are two exercises that have helped me rev up my writing mojo when I felt my tank was empty. What’s nice about brainstorming and prewriting is that they are open-ended activities and there’s no right way to complete them. The purpose is to create ideas for your story. It’s much easier to get started when you have some sense of what you’re going to be writing that day.
A lot of writers like to skip the brainstorming/prewriting part, but I recommend taking the time to think things through. The more ideas you have, the easier it will be to push past the difficult first draft.
One of my favorite ways to brainstorm is called the Quick Sketch. I use this activity with my writing students. The Quick Sketch helps writers find some sense of the arc that will guide them through the beginning, middle, and end of their stories.
A Quick Sketch is easy to complete. Take a blank sheet of paper, or you can do this digitally on a computer if you prefer. Divide the paper into thirds and label the first part Beginning, the second part Middle, and the third part End.
Remember, there is no right way to do this. It amazes me how students of all ages get so stressed over making mistakes about how they fold the paper. People are obsessed with getting things just right. There is no “just right” here. Relax. This is for your use. This activity is simply a tangible way to work through your thought process. If you do this on three old dinner napkins it’s all good. You can use lined paper or not use lined paper. You can do this on one sheet of paper or use an entire sheet for each section.
Leave space in each of the three sections for both writing and drawing. Yes, you read that correctly. Drawing. Remember that thing we used to do when we were young and uninhibited? Again, I won’t bore you with the research, but some studies show how drawing helps our brains understand better. I studied storytelling and creativity for my Ph.D. dissertation, and both are fascinating subjects. Drawing is another thing people get all worked up about because they don’t draw like artists. Take a breath. It’s okay. No one is going to see this but you. You’re not creating something that will be displayed in a museum. Draw stick people. I do.
Your task with the Quick Sketch is to sketch out through writing and drawing what you think is going to happen in the beginning, middle, and end of your story. Notice I said what you think is going to happen because any and all of these ideas are subject to change as you come to know your characters and your plot better. You can either write first or draw first. I usually write first and then draw, but if you’d rather draw first and then write, that’s cool.
You don’t have to fill out the Quick Sketch in order. I usually know the ending of my story first, so I fill out the End section and then go back to the Beginning and the Middle as I figure out how I’m going to get to the ending. You can also add notes about what historical information you might need in each section. Actually, you can add anything you want to the chart, anything that helps you think through your story. This is your chart.
I’ve also had writing students fill out a KWL chart. The KWL chart is a simple way of gauging your knowledge on any topic. Take a sheet of blank paper, or you can do this on the computer. Again, divide the paper into thirds or use three separate sheets of paper. Whatever floats your boat. Label one section K, the next W, and the third L.
In the K section, answer the question: What do I know? In the W section, answer the question: What do I want to learn? In the L section, answer the question: What did I learn?
I use the KWL chart to keep track of my historical information. What do I know about the era I’m writing about, and what do I want to learn about it, and then after I’ve gone through the research process I fill in what I learned. The chart is an easy way for me to keep track of my progress. Most of my writing students use their KWL charts the same way, but some use them to help plan out their story since they prefer answering these questions to filling out the Quick Sketch.
If you’re looking for some general historical fiction brainstorming prompts, try these:
1. Which era of history are you writing about? Be as specific as possible. A topic like the American Civil War is broad, but a subject like the battle at Gettysburg works well.
2. What is the setting of your story? Where specifically will it take place?
3. Who is your main character?
4. Who are your supporting characters?
5. Who is your antagonist?
6. What is the problem your main character(s) will be facing?
7. How will the problem be resolved? How will your story end? What is the last image the reader will take away from your story?
8. What is the theme or deeper meaning of your story?
9. How does your main character change from the beginning of your story to the end?
10. How many pages a day will you write?
11. How will you organize your schedule to find time to write?
12. How will you deal with writer’s block?
This last question might seem odd, and it is, but if you have a plan in place when writer’s block hits, and it will, it helps to alleviate the anxiety on those days when you can’t remember how to spell your name.
Sometimes free writing helps me break through the first draft blues. Free writing is exactly what it sounds like—you’re free to write whatever comes to mind. Some writers use a timer, set it for 10, 15, or 20 minutes, and either type or handwrite whatever occurs to them during that time. You can write about your historical story or you can write about anything else. The point isn’t what you’re writing—the point is that you’re writing. As Natalie Goldberg says, writing is a physical activity, and writing itself, writing anything, can get the juices flowing.
Free writing was a great help to me when I was writing Victory Garden and I was completely stumped for the beginning. I knew the ending, as I usually do, but I didn’t know where to start. I tried this beginning and that beginning and nothing was working for me. I became so frustrated I didn’t touch the manuscript for weeks. Finally, one day I started free writing about the women fighting for the vote. I wasn’t writing a scene or anything in particular. I just imagined my main character in a room with other women fighting for the vote and I wrote what I saw.
As I was free writing I remembered a tidbit from my research, the day when women from the suffrage movement went to the White House to meet President Woodrow Wilson, so I incorporated that into my passage. After a bit of revising and editing, I ended up with what became the beginning of the novel. The women at the White House scene was even published separately as a short story in a literary journal. From nothing I got a whole lot of something, all from some random free writing where my only intention was to get myself going.
I’m also a big fan of Anne Lamott’s idea for short assignments. In Bird by Bird, Lamott shares the idea of writing what you can see through a one-inch picture frame—one paragraph where you describe a scene from your story. Short assignments take away the inherent fear that comes with tackling a project.
When you think, “I want to write a historical novel about the fall of Rome,” the grandness of the task can be paralyzing. If you say instead, “I’m going to write a paragraph describing Rome burning,” that is doable. For my first drafts, I have a 500-word-a-day goal to meet. Five hundred words may not sound like a lot, but it’s enough to move the story forward and not so much that it feels overwhelming. As soon as a first draft feels overwhelming I’ll avoid it with every Excuse I have, and I have plenty of them, I promise you. If the juices are flowing I’ll keep writing. Other times getting to that 500th word feels like root canal. Once I’ve met my 500 words, though, I can feel good because I met my goal. When I’m writing a first draft my main priority is to make progress every day, and 500 words works for me.
Oscar Collier suggests writing three pages a day, which, if you’re typing on double-spaced pages, works out to about 750 words. Some people give themselves a 1000-word-a-day goal. Yes, you’ll read articles about people who write 5000, 10000, even 15000 words a day. If that’s you, cool. For the rest of us, short, attainable assignments can make the difference between whether or not our historical stories get written.
Other get-yourself-going activities include mind maps, bullet points, or a character sketch. The point now is to gather ideas so you have something to work with when you sit down to write. Sometimes I keep a writing journal where I keep track of everything about my current work in progress that occurs to me. When I’m stumped I pull out my journal and review the ideas I’ve already come up with, and then I’ll use some of those ideas as the basis for my writing that day.
A schedule can also help since you have already carved out a certain amount of time each day for writing. Some writers wake up early to get their writing done before they start the rest of their day. Others write at night when the house is quiet. I tend to work on my fiction during the late afternoon hours (around 3 p.m.-ish). Find the time that works for you, but you have to commit to writing during that time.
I’m a big believer that if you want to write badly enough then you’ll make time for it. How many times have you been watching TV or scrolling through social media when you could have been writing instead? I’m as guilty of that as anyone. To help you meet your daily word count, you should limit distractions. I know some writers who use an app to restrict their internet access during their writing time. Some writers learn to ignore the temptation to check their emails. Turn away from social media, put your phone on airplane mode, and walk away from the TV. Tell your cat you’ll talk to her later. Hold your writing time as sacred because it is. And then you should be proud of yourself when you complete your word count for the day. There are so many other ways you could have spent your time, but you decided to work on your historical story. Hurrah!
It doesn’t matter how you get yourself going. It only matters that you get going. Otherwise, that great historical story you want to share will never be told.