I'm kinda that opposite, re: outlining. It was a full on 'choir of angels descending through the clouds' moment when I learned how to outline, and saw how useful it was to me. I found that by not having to make things be prose straight away, I could make things quicker and more freer because I wasn't having to juggle 'what happens next?' and 'how do I write what happens in a way that sounds good' at the same time. But yeah, I do get how for some people, outlining would just make things a bit stiffer.
I think for me, it's kind of a framing thing? For a lot of people the frame of 'this first draft is bad' is helpful, while for me the frame of 'this first draft is not done yet' is more helpful. And I think most of the people going around shouting "Your first draft is going to inevitably be terrible!" are trying to spread the good word of writing freely and not worrying too much in early stages-- but it doesn't land that way to me.
And it is possible to smooth/edit stuff out way to much, to the point where one is either going in circles, or accidentally smoothing the voice out of it.
I also get the idea of being self deprecating before anyone can be other-deprecating, but I find it still rankles. Especially because I had it drilled into me early on (in a performance context, but I do think this applies to other types of art): The audience often doesn't know what was meant to happen. You can get away with theatrical-murder if you don't let the audience know a mistake happened, or something stuffed up. So you never tell the audience that a mistake happened or that something is bad.
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timeasmymeasure
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Date: 2019-07-03 12:22 am (UTC)I think for me, it's kind of a framing thing? For a lot of people the frame of 'this first draft is bad' is helpful, while for me the frame of 'this first draft is not done yet' is more helpful. And I think most of the people going around shouting "Your first draft is going to inevitably be terrible!" are trying to spread the good word of writing freely and not worrying too much in early stages-- but it doesn't land that way to me.
And it is possible to smooth/edit stuff out way to much, to the point where one is either going in circles, or accidentally smoothing the voice out of it.
I also get the idea of being self deprecating before anyone can be other-deprecating, but I find it still rankles. Especially because I had it drilled into me early on (in a performance context, but I do think this applies to other types of art): The audience often doesn't know what was meant to happen. You can get away with theatrical-murder if you don't let the audience know a mistake happened, or something stuffed up. So you never tell the audience that a mistake happened or that something is bad.