Knowing what one does not know

Writing is a journey, some say, and/or a process of discovery, others say.

During this journey, we intend certain things. We decide to write a novel about a young man in the mountains. Then we ponder what he might do there, whom he will meet, and what the terrain looks like.

Hemingway advised writeers not to talk their stories away. I take that to mean that in the planning stages--and during the first moments of creation, the story is rather like an innocent child who is not quite formed, not q...