Write Time

‘So have you got any New Year’s Resolutions?’ people ask each other at this time of year and I recently found myself offering up the same one as last year and the year before that.

‘To write more,’ I said and even though I meant it sincerely, I cringed inwardly as I said it.  Because I have been here before, too many times and I knew deep down that my hopes were doomed.

Or are they?  I don’t know if it is the eternal optimist in me, but something has felt a bit different in the last few days.  As a teacher, I have enjoyed the last two weeks off work, and the leisurely lie-ins and general laziness of my Christmas holidays have resulted in a strange phenomenon. 

During the evening, I find my mind firing up, ready to create.  By the time I get into bed I am positively buzzing with ideas.  As I turn out the light I have to fight the urge to get up and turn on my laptop.  I feel like I could write all night.

Perplexed by this strange turn of events, I reached out to the community of the Internet.  Surely I couldn’t be the only one with these nocturnal yearnings? 

A few clicks later, I found the confirmation that I needed.  A guest blog post by Jonathan Manor on Jeff Goins’ blog about  writing at http://goinswriter.com/night-writing/
revealed that there are plenty of writers, bloggers and freelancers, for whom the twilight hours are a hotbed of creativity. 

Manor questions the received wisdom that the morning is the best time to write and explains that, for him, writing at night works best,

‘…because it’s devoid of distraction, there’s nothing else left to do in the day, there’s no one else to hurry to. It’s simply just you being yourself and pouring out the emotions that you’ve gathered from your day time experience and using that creativity to create something beautiful and interesting.’

Further reading on the topic led me to Matt Shoard's blog post on Writing at Night,
which reveals a long list of famous authors who wrote at night, including Tennessee Williams, Charles Dickens and TS Eliot.  http://www.theguardian.com/books/booksblog/2010/dec/21/writing-at-night

I had thought that my lack of productivity during the day was due to a lethal mix of perfectionism, procrastination and a general lack of willpower.  But looking back I see that the reason most of my first drafts are written in the evening is simply because I am responding to my natural writing rhythms.  While redrafting and editing are fine for me as daytime activities, my initial creative burst needs to happen at nightfall.

All day long I have been trying to write this blog post.  I had no idea what to write and I felt that I had nothing to say.  At 8.30pm it suddenly came to me and flowed out with ease.  So my New Year’s Resolution has been retained but extended slightly. ‘Write more, but at the right time.’  And the next time I have an urge to create as I turn out the light, I will get up and write.