Now I’m into November, and the tight schedule for NaNoWriMo, I’m very aware of how many words a day I should be writing. I’m on day four so a reasonable amount at this point would be about 6-8,000 if I want to get 50,000 done by the end of the month.
I’m on about 700…
I’m not worried about this because I haven’t had a lot of time to work on the story since Thursday. Still, I am hoping this week things will improve somewhat, and I’m also hoping to get another few hundred done today – but it’s got me thinking about the arbitrary nature of word counts.
I’ve always thought that word counts are a strange way of judging how far I’ve got with a story. This could be due to my style of writing, where I map out a scene in the first draft then fill in details as I revise the story. Or, it could be due to the fact that a book could be anything from 50,000 – 500,000 words long!
Having said that, they are one of many useful tools for a writer. Knowing how many words you have got on paper does show that something is happening – just not the quality or relevance of that work. So, I’ll carry on working to get towards the target number of words this month, but I know from experience that it’s only once the first draft is completed that I can really see how far I’ve got.
In other news – now Halloween is over, here in the UK we have Bonfire Night (or if you prefer, Guy Fawkes Night). A few years ago I attended an event that involved people walking down a hill through an old town, down cobbled streets in the darkness, lit by flaming torches. It really was a spectacle and one that deserves to be written into a book or a poem – I’m hoping to include a scene like this in my NaNo piece if I can fit it in. It’s one of those events that is full of dramatic possibilities!
And finally for this week – I saw this gallery of books that are hard to finish, and it made me smile – the only one I’ve tried is Das Kapital (and not even the whole thing!) which was for an essay when I was a student. How can a book be hard to read, and yet a prize-winning book? Surely readers want to be able to finish the story…
At least this proves that a word count isn’t the only thing to think about!
Happy writing
EJ
🙂
Becoming a writer 
I’m surprised Ulysses (James Joyce) wasn’t on the list. I read the whole thing, just so I could say I read it!
Best of luck with the ‘word count’ – I totally agree with you on that one…
In my last writing course I had to read a bit of this, I think it was Molly’s ‘flow of consciousness’. That was enough for me!
🙂