A note about Neal Stephenson--something that I didn't realize. He writes his novels out in longhand. On paper, with a pen. All, like, 1000 pages or so of each fucking one.
Shelby Foote wrote his entire Civil War trilogy that way. Longhand, with an old-style ink pen. Not only that, he never revised any of it. As far as I can tell, the whole damn thing is one giant, slowly-written first draft. And it's amazing stuff.
Yeah. Whenever I stop to think about all the classics that were written, pre-computer, pre-typewriter even, I realize what an inferior writer I am. I can just barely hold all my thoughts together and express them coherently, typing them out on my keyboard.
But Stephenson's on another plane altogether. I just keep thinking of the Baroque Cycle. That thing is a single interwoven, coherent (though immensely complicated) story, and it's three times as long as Lord of the Rings. Plus, it was written in such a manner as to sync up with actual European history!
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But Stephenson's on another plane altogether. I just keep thinking of the Baroque Cycle. That thing is a single interwoven, coherent (though immensely complicated) story, and it's three times as long as Lord of the Rings. Plus, it was written in such a manner as to sync up with actual European history!
And all I can say is, "Fuck."
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