Why Deadlines Are Every Writer's Secret Weapon

Happy Camp NaNoWriMo Launch Day! Camp is fresh out of the oven, with new features to spice things up. And to help you get ready for your July writing project, we’re excerpting No Plot? No Problem! , written by NaNoWriMo’s weird-and-wise founder himself: Chris Baty. Today, he explains the magic power of a writer’s deadline:

When I actually sat down to write my first novel back in 1999, I discovered that my ideas about novel writing were woefully mistaken. You don’t need a plot before you write a novel, nor do you need an evocative sense of place or a winsome, engaging cast. You don’t even need coffee (though I still haven’t allowed myself to fully come to terms with that yet). What you really need is a secret weapon.

You need a superpowered, diabolical device that will transform you into a bastion of literary accomplishment. And I’m happy to report that this implement is in the house, and it’s just waiting for you to pick it up.

Without hyperbole, I can say that this tool is the most awesome catalyst that has ever been unleashed on the worlds of art and commerce. Nearly every beautiful and useful thing you’ve ever touched or witnessed was born in its mighty forge. It’s portable, affordable, and nonpolluting. 

It’s also invisible.

What you need to write a novel, of course, is a deadline.

Deadlines are the dynamos of the modern age. They’ve built every city, won every contest, and helped all of us pay our taxes reasonably close to on time for years and years. Deadlines bring focus, forcing us to make time for the achievements we would otherwise postpone, encouraging us to reach beyond our conservative estimates of what we think possible, helping us to wrench victory from the jaws of sleep. 

A deadline is, simply put, optimism in its most ass-kicking form. It’s a potent force that, when wielded with respect, will level any obstacle in its path. This is especially true when it comes to creative pursuits.

In the artistic realms, deadlines do much more than just get projects finished. They serve as creative midwives, as enthusiastic shepherds adept at plucking the timid inspirations that lurk in the wings of our imaginations and flinging them bodily into the bright light of day. The bigger the artistic project, the more it needs a deadline to keep marshaling those shy ideas out onto the world’s stage.

Nowhere is this more true than in novel writing. Drafting a novel typically involves years of navigating a jungle of plots, subplots, supporting characters, tangents, symbols, and motifs. A single troublesome passage may stop the writing for years as the writer fusses and stews and waits for the way forward to become clear.

Writing on a deadline changes that. Having an end-date for your quest through the noveling unknown is like bringing along a team of jetpack-wearing, entrepreneurial Sherpas. These energetic guides not only make passage easier through myriad formidable obstacles, but they’ll fly ahead and open coffeeshops and convenience stores along the route.