{"id":939,"date":"2012-04-23T10:48:20","date_gmt":"2012-04-23T17:48:20","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/?p=939"},"modified":"2012-04-24T07:55:31","modified_gmt":"2012-04-24T14:55:31","slug":"a-writers-reflections-on-rowing","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2012\/writing\/a-writers-reflections-on-rowing\/","title":{"rendered":"A Writer’s Reflections on Rowing"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>I had the pleasure recently of rowing a boat in Central Park, New York. While paddling around on the lake, I got to thinking how much rowing is like writing. There are so many choices. You can go in circles getting nowhere, confused as to what direction to take. Or you can go backwards and forwards, essentially staying in the same spot. Or you can meander all over the place with no particular destination in mind. And then there is the rower who methodically plans out his journey from A to B, with little or no surprises along the way.<\/p>\n

I suspect the writers who plan it all out are the ones who can knock off three novels in one year whereas the ones who meander take three or more years to write one.<\/p>\n

I guess I belong to the latter group. I write like I row,\u00a0 all over the place, letting the story, like the boat, take me to places I didn\u2019t expect.<\/p>\n

I don\u2019t think I\u2019m about to change the way I write. It doesn\u2019t suit me to map it all out beforehand. I like surprises. I like the characters I\u2019ve created to tell me things I didn\u2019t know beforehand. I love following them in ways I hadn\u2019t anticipated. That is when I have the most fun on the page.<\/p>\n

Like rowing, writing isn\u2019t just about the destination, it\u2019s also about the journey. But no matter what plan you have for writing that great novel or short story, you still have to get to the end. Happy rowing.<\/p>\n

Any comments on the above would be appreciated.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I had the pleasure recently of rowing a boat in Central Park, New York. While paddling around on the lake, I got to thinking how much rowing is like writing.… <\/p>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_feature_clip_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2},"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[4],"tags":[317,9,318,20,33,5],"class_list":["post-939","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-writing","tag-central-park","tag-novel","tag-rowing","tag-short-story","tag-writer","tag-writing-2"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p1LuVB-f9","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":296,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2011\/writing\/more-thoughts-on-writing-rules-2\/","url_meta":{"origin":939,"position":0},"title":"More thoughts on writing rules","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"5 \u041a\u0432\u0456\u0442\u043d\u044f, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"Paula Renaye, author of The Hardlines Self-Help Handbook www.hardlineselfhelp.com had an interesting response to my earlier post on writing rules. As she said I could post her thoughts, here they are: \"It's funny, we all approach a topic from our experiences and our own lens. When I first started writing,\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Writing"","block_context":{"text":"Writing","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/writing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2062,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2015\/writing\/putting-spice-in-your-brand\/","url_meta":{"origin":939,"position":1},"title":"Putting Spice In Your Brand","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"17 \u0422\u0440\u0430\u0432\u043d\u044f, 2015","format":false,"excerpt":"What kind of writer are you? Do you have a series with a protagonist that shows up in every book you write? Do you write in the same genre? Do you think about your brand when you\u2019re writing? What spice are you putting in your brand? When I look at\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Writing"","block_context":{"text":"Writing","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/writing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"Putting Spice In Your Brand","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AegyptischerBasar-2.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200,"srcset":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AegyptischerBasar-2.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=350%2C200 1x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AegyptischerBasar-2.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=525%2C300 1.5x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AegyptischerBasar-2.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=700%2C400 2x, https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/05\/AegyptischerBasar-2.jpg?fit=1200%2C803&ssl=1&resize=1050%2C600 3x"},"classes":[]},{"id":3015,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2017\/uncategorized\/writing-the-setting\/","url_meta":{"origin":939,"position":2},"title":"Writing Settings For A Novel That Engages The Reader","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"18 \u0421\u0456\u0447\u043d\u044f, 2017","format":false,"excerpt":"Writing the settings for a novel is one feature of a Novel Writing Workshop I'll be giving at the North Vancouver library.\u00a0In thinking about my presentation, I thought I'd share a few things I've learned over time. Setting is the world of our characters. 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I\u2019m not sure why except that I\u2019ve been writing a story in which so many of the characters are drawn from people who are already dead. Drawing on Family Stories My third\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Documentary"","block_context":{"text":"Documentary","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/film-2\/documentary\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"if the dead could only talk","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/01\/do-not-say-we-have-nothing2-199x300.jpg?resize=350%2C200&ssl=1","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1090,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2012\/writing\/fifty-shades-of-bliss\/","url_meta":{"origin":939,"position":4},"title":"Fifty Shades of Bliss","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"27 \u0412\u0435\u0440\u0435\u0441\u043d\u044f, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"I\u2019ve been away from my writing celebrating fifty years of marriage. That's right, 50! I know, it\u2019s a shocker. But just to explain, we were married in kindergarten. Yeah, that young. It\u2019s hard to believe, but back in the 60s, anything was possible and rules were broken. Rob and I\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Life"","block_context":{"text":"Life","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/life\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/Rob-and-I-at-Strathcona-300x198.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1702,"url":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/2014\/writing\/writing-process-blog-hop\/","url_meta":{"origin":939,"position":5},"title":"WRITING PROCESS BLOG HOP","author":"Diana Stevan","date":"7 \u041b\u0438\u043f\u043d\u044f, 2014","format":false,"excerpt":"When you read all those wonderful books, do you ever wonder about the writer? Where the ideas come from? What a writer\u2019s day is like? What makes them tick? Are they as crazy as their characters, or do they draw from some other well? The writing process blog hop will\u2026","rel":"","context":"\u0423 "Writing"","block_context":{"text":"Writing","link":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/category\/writing\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"My Baba, Lukia Mazurec","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/www.dianastevan.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/10\/P1090283-300x297.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/939","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=939"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/939\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=939"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=939"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.dianastevan.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=939"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}