Writing a First Draft - Surviving First Draft Blues

Writing a first draft of your novel is both a scary and a magical time...

• It is scary because facing a blank sheet of paper, or a blank computer screen, and having to fill it with words, takes grit and determination.
• It is magical because you get to see your fictional characters come to life at last on the printed page, like your children taking their first steps.

The magical part of writing a first draft is something to look forward to. The daunting part really isn't as daunting as some people would have you believe. It is really a question of taking it day by day and knowing that, over time, the words will stack up.

How Do You Write a First Draft?

There really is no easy answer to that, except to say that you've just got to write it. I can provide you with plenty of help and advice on planning a novel, and then making your words the best that they can be when you revise the novel.

But the in-between part - filling all those pages with words when you write the first draft - is something you can only do for yourself. Sorry, sister, but there it is.

A good piece of advice is to not worry too much about the quality of the language the first time around. In fact, if you are anything like most writers, you will probably hate what you produce in the first instance.

A first draft, by definition, is something that will end up in the recycling bin, so don't even try to make it sound like great literature. That happens later, when you edit your novel.

As a matter of fact, it is best not to worry about the quality of the language at all at this stage. Writing a first draft is simply about getting black on white. You can even make your prose embarrassingly awful if you feel like it - all you need is something to build upon later.

Writing a First Draft Takes Professionalism

Having said everything I have said above, here is something to put a smile on your face...

The very fact that you are reading this (and are therefore tackling the writing of a novel in a methodical and purposeful way) makes the writing of the first draft so much easier for you than it does for other, more haphazard writers.

When most people decide to write a novel, all they actually have in mind is writing the first draft. They believe that the first draft (or, to them, the only draft) is the beginning and the end of the entire novel writing process.

• Sure, they might do a little planning before hand, in the form of a few scribbled notes on a sheet or two of A4 - just enough for them to be able to visualize their novel in their minds before they get on with the real task of actually writing it.
• And they might do a little revision afterwards - probably not much beyond weeding out the typos.
• But, for them, writing a first draft is essentially the beginning and the end of the matter. And they wonder why their novels are then swiftly rejected.

Professional writers plan, sometimes for a year or more.

If they are skilled enough and experienced enough, some will combine the planning stage with the drafting stage - that is, they will plan in their heads as they go.

More often, though, the planning stage involves no writing at all - just lots of note-taking and lots of thinking time.

Professional writers also revise, often obsessively.

As they get better at what they do, they might have to edit less, but they will still have to do it. They know that no writer, however talented, can possibly hope to transfer the novel from their heads onto paper in a single go.

First drafts are meant to be messy, rough, clunky, way too embarrassing to show to the world. But that is okay.

• First, you plan - maybe a little, maybe a lot. This ensures that the first draft will be structurally sound.
• Next, you write the first draft, not worrying about how ugly it is.
• Finally, you make it pretty by revising it, over and over and over.

Because professional writers understand this process, they rarely come down with first draft blues.