E.B. White photographed by Jill Krementz
In a recent episode of his podcast, Cal Newport says he doesn’t believe in writer’s block, and other professional writers don’t either. “Writer’s block” is part of the normal writing process. Writing is usually laborious; writers rarely experience “flow” or get visited by the Muse. As Chuck Close says, “Inspiration is for amateurs.” So what feels like writer’s block to most people feels like the usual process to a more experienced writer.
But I was surprised to hear Newport also suggest he and other accomplished writers sometimes stare at blank screens, uncertain what to type next. Perhaps he meant this metaphorically because I doubt he or any other established writers take this approach.
As Armin Nassen notes: “The white sheet of paper — or today: the blank screen — is a fundamental misunderstanding.” (no link available)
Instead, writing should start with reading, creating notes on the subject, formulating a unique take, then reformulating those notes into a draft.
In How to Take Smart Notes, Sönke Ahrens argues for such a nonlinear process. Writers build and revisit interrelated notes based on reading. Then they order and weave these notes into prose. Ahrens criticizes writing instructors for attempting to “squeeze a nonlinear process like writing into a nonlinear order,” resulting in “the very problems and frustration” they set out to solve.
By seeing it as a nonlinear process, we appreciate that writing is fundamentally about thinking through ideas. As John Rogers says: “You can’t think yourself out of a writing block; you have to write yourself out of a thinking block.”
This takes work. As William Zinnser describes it, the writer’s job has always been to create what someone else wants to read. And good writing still requires “plain old hard thinking” and “the plain old tools” of language. To remind himself and his students of this reality, Zinnser hangs in his office a photograph of a 77-year-old E.B. White, working in a boathouse with a plain wooden table, with just his typewriter, paper, and a nail keg (for trashing drafts). Writers have always worked like this.
Yet people often fail to recognize the hard work that goes into good writing, or making anything else of value. When talking about magic, Teller says, “You will be fooled by a trick if it involves more time, money and practice than you (or any other sane onlooker) would be willing to invest.”
That’s why reading good writing can feel like witnessing a magic trick. To perform this sleight-of-hand, writers spend more time rethinking ideas and wrangling words than others would be willing to do.
But we shouldn’t start with a blank screen. Instead: capture ideas with notes, remix the notes, and write the prose.
So, even if writer’s block is real for some, it doesn’t need to be for you.