How to make art
This short passage from BLDGBLOB seems to me a description of how to go about making art (from what is around you) or indeed, to write creatively (from what is around you). Dismantling your environment and refashioning it into the tools of your own escape, what else do artists do? BLDGBLOG: How to dismantle your...
British Library, redux
Last week I had a curiously psychogeographical day in London. It was also curiously satisfying. First, I went to get a readers card for the British Library. When I first came to London, in 1985, I also went and got myself a readers card. Back then, the British Library was in the round room in...
A poem for Xmas
Spent We are spent,our civility undone,desire squirted out,secretions secreted. What was continent isincontinent.Collectively our seed fell on stony ground. Time to discover what we got for our savings,like, fuck all. We spent jackasses after making babies,lying on our sidesgasping for toys tat toffee ipad laptop clipclop nice shop apple store more. There is always more,it...
How Punk Rock Led Me To The Joys and Perils of Self Publishing
Yeah, me too.How Punk Rock Led Me Down The Garden Path To The Joys and Perils of Self Publishing – IndieReader Punk was a generation-defining social movement which accidentally gave birth to the fanzine—a Xerox-nourished zygote that slowly grew and mutated—decades later—into independent publishers and POD. The startling realization that you could do things yourself—put...
Workroom: Writers on Writing
I’m a bit addicted to the Workspace posts on John August’s blog (I assume he’s called John August, it’s at johnaugust.com). It’s all about screenwriters, but screenwriters are writers the same as the rest of us. Plus, I rather fancy some screenwriting at some point in my writing career. This week it was Christine Boylan...
Research files in Scrivener
I like to put research documents right next to the pages that I’m writing. Scrivener likes you to keep them separate. Here’s a way to get round that without making a terrible mess. Keep your research close
Non-linear writing
Scrivener is the perfect management tool for non-linear writing, i.e. you can get the benefits of a non-linear approach without the downsides. In her On Writing blog, Rebecca Blain writes, “When I write linearly, I am able to adjust the events later in the novel due to the events of earlier in the novel,” I...
How to Sync Scrivener
Scrivener has a function that allows you to set up an external (to Scrivener) folder and ‘sync’ all your Scrivener files there. This is a two way process, Scrivener writes the files out to the folder in RTF format and also syncs them back to Scrivener again. This means that you can edit the files...
Making word count fun
You can track your word count in Scrivener using some funky tools.
How to jump right in and start writing in Scrivener
Scrivener can seem intimidating on first sight – it’s hard to know where to start. It’s a complex software with many tools to help you with your writing. It can be intimidating to anyone who is used to a word processor with its single page. But Scrivener is not complex to start writing in. In...
Rimbaud’s Last Poem
Passage from AphinarRimbaud’s Last Poem One shipment: a single tuskOne shipment: two tusksOne shipment: three tusksOne shipment: four tusksOne shipment: two tusks I have come to enquire if I have left anything on account with you. I wish today to change over to another transport line, to leave this one whose name I do not...
Eleven Reasons to use Scrivener for your writing
I’ve noticed a lot of writers pop up and ask questions like should I move to Scrivener, why should I use Scrivener, how is Scrivener better? Here are ten eleven great reasons to use Scrivener.