Wool-gathering

Doris Lessing in her memoir, 'Walking in the Shade' describes the true process of writing as wool-gathering. quote '...this goes on when you are shopping, cooking, anything.' 'And what about the pages discarded and thrown away, the stories that were misbegotten - into the waste-paper basket, the ideas that lived in your mind for a day or two, or a week, but haven't any life, so out with them.' (pp 94-95)

She is so right. The mind is constantly full with the current project; you hear something or see something, file it away or jot it down, try it out, turn it upside down, run it by your writing friends and keep it or not depending on whether it has life or not.

Later she says, 'I think a writer's real life is understood only by another writer. And a few other people. These used to be publishers.'

What follows are 10 interesting pages of how the publishing world has changed since her first publications in the 1940s ansd 1950s. She can probably come up with another ten interesting pages on the state of publishing in the 2000s, book printers who 'never look inside the book' and E publishing. Can't imagine her sitting through the seminar I attended 2 weeks ago unless she was strapped to a chair and had a mouth gag.

Progress this week: have reworked Vignettes of hospital life and sent off to the SWWJ life writing competition. The deadline has been extended to Nov 30 so there's still time my fellow wool-gatherers. Am re-working what is now chapter 15, going to the Bahamas.

Have read another biography from Favorite Reads, will write the review tomorrow. At some point will have a go at writing a synopsis.....again!!!! It's  like being in the middle of a lemon squeezer, wringing out the essence drop by drop. Very painful, amd mostly unsuccessful. I prefer wool-gathering.