Sunday, February 11, 2007

Weekly Word Count, Feb 5-Feb 11

I seem to hitting a pattern or stride. I write about the same amount every week, totaling 600 words. All poetry. I like that I have a routine. It feels good to have consistent writing a part of my life again.

I haven't really spent much time on fiction. I think this in large part to the death of my writing group a couple of months ago. They were all fiction writers, so I wrote fiction with them. They felt more comfortable critiquing it and I liked the experimentation.

Now, that I have been posting to Poetry Thursday, I've got other poets to get feedback from. I love it, I love it, I love it. (Did I mention that I love it?) Fiction has been taking a back seat, again, and I'm okay with that.

So, 600 for the week. 7269 for the year. Maybe I'll try to integrate an extra poem or haiku in the mix, to up my word count for next week. However, I'm expecting a lower than average word count, because the end of the term is this week. Hooray for grading.

5 Comments:

Ó Seasnáin said...

Hi. I found your site through Poetry Thursday. Congratulations! Those are some numbers for completed works. I'll have to stop by again.

Jessica said...

Thanks for stopping by O seasnain!

I'll have to be honest, my numbers are a little fudged. I give myself 500 words credit for each poem, and 100 words for a haiku, and these are all first drafts. (I draft many times.)

My feeling is that poetry is more difficult than fiction, so even though I may have written 100 words in a longer poem, it is comparable to 500 in fiction. Still 2 poems a week rocks compared to my typical 0. :)

Thanks for the encouragement!

Unknown said...

I had a writing group (of just one other person, but just the same) which was fiction-based as well and I actually managed to get a nice draft of a novel out of it! I had been craving poetry though: it is my home base, my familiar, my true love, and so when I started my new blog (at teh same time as I started a new job adn my "writing group" was no more) I joined PT and am really happy to be getting more poetry again. I've managed to put a manuscript together too - it feels very good to be back in poetry's grip.

You keep on keepin' on there 9 to 5er!

Jessica said...

PWADJ -- I've had a similar experience with my old writer's group. Except I only got 60 pages into my novel, and then I realized it had no plot. They all encouraged me and assured me that's okay, but I think a plot's kind of a big thing in fiction. Or so I heard.

Now that I'm posting on PT, I find that I'm much more connected to poetry again. Doesn't it feel different to write poetry than fiction? For me, it just feels right, like it's home for me. Fiction always felt a little forced. (Maybe it was because I was forcing myself to write it. Hmmmm...)

Unknown said...

I always like to say that "writing my novel completely dehumanized me" and I exaggerate, but on some level, I felt it was true. Because in comparison, poetry elevates me.

Ps: plot is sorta important...not in prose poetry though, which is this week's PT idea!