Reading Rec: Refuse to Be Done
Matt Bell Guides You Through Novel Writing
I’m not aware where I first heard the idea that the story you’re writing is smarter than you are, but I find the concept 100% true. In his insightful and inspiring craft book, Refuse to be Done, Matt Bell attributes this view to Lucy Corin, quoting her, “The story is always smarter than you—there will be patterns of theme, image, and idea that are much savvier and more complex than you could have come up with on your own . . . Become a student of your work in progress. Every aspect of a story has its own story.”
This idea is just one encouraging nugget in Bell’s book about how to write a novel in three drafts (a lofty goal; Bell himself admits that these three drafts may more accurately be considered “stages” through which the writer moves fluidly). To each draft, Bell designates a function. The first draft is generative. You write to produce pages. The writing, even if you have a detailed outline, is exploratory. Invite discovery and have fun. The second draft is narrative. Here the story takes shape. Structure emerges. Your focus is plot. In the final draft, you polish the work.
Many of my clients come to me at the beginning of their writing projects, and so in my copy of Bell’s book, his chapter on first drafts is my most highlighted, annotated, and dog-eared. I reference it often and use it for my own work. This chapter teems with helpful advice, but it also highlights the more magical aspects of writing. For instance, as stated above, your story is smarter than you are. He also writes, “… listen to the pages you’re accumulating: as you play on, writing your story, sooner or later that pages begin to play back.” Isn’t that so fun?! Can writing be fun? Bell argues that yes, it can.