Gareth L Powell “Like Easing into a Hot Bath”
This month’s special guest Gareth L Powell reveals how starting a novel is a bit like bath time (without the rubber ducks)…
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TRANSCRIPT
MARK: What’s the thing that makes you think you’re ready to start writing on a project?
GARETH: As I was saying earlier, it is… sort of things gradually accrete, and sort of clump together and, it’s kind of… there isn’t a single kind of, oh, let’s go! But I kind of write my way into it. So I’ll start, you know, I’ll write the first line, I’ll write a paragraph and think hmm, okay. And then I’ll go back and I’ll rewrite the outline. The outline is usually about a page, just a very brief kind of high level overview of the plot. And I’ll rewrite that about ten times to fix it. And then I’ll start writing a first chapter, maybe that won’t be going anywhere, so I’ll start again. Or realise I picked the wrong character, and I just kind of write my way into the book so that by the time I’m about 5000 words in, starting to pick up steam, and I think: right. I know where we’re going now. So I might chop out the all the original stuff, but yeah, it’s kind of like easing yourself into a hot bath.
MARK: (Noting a listener comment): Elinor says this is the most British conversation ever. Tea and a hot bath. Yes. Brilliant.
