Despite the humble beginnings of NaNoWriMo in 1999 as a project begun by Chris Baty in the San Francisco area encompassing 21 initial participants – today the creative writing project has an international scope with over 100,000 participants having signed up in 2007. The challenge for writers? To produce a novel of 50,000 words or greater over the course of the month of November, averaging roughly 1,666 words per day in completing a finished piece.
What is NaNoWriMo?
Essentially, NaNoWriMo is a grassroots initiative aimed at trying to motivate both professional and amateur writers to simply write, and write voluminously in the hopes of producing a novel. Simply finishing the rather grueling challenge within the provided timeframe is an achievement by itself!
The website offers a description of the event : Valuing enthusiasm and perseverance over painstaking craft, NaNoWriMo is a novel-writing program for everyone who has thought fleetinglyabout writing a novel but has been scared away by the time and effort involved. Because of the limited writing window, the ONLY thing that matters in NaNoWriMo is output.
It's all about quantity, not quality. The kamikaze approach forces you to lower your expectations, take risks, and write on the fly.This approach towards a frenzied, energetic output is essentially the key to the success of the project – it is competetive in a friendly, self-managed way. By challenging one's own internal barrier and testing your perseverance and dedication – emerging victorious over this challenge provides self-confidence and a finished work to prove your initiative.
Why Participate?
Participating in NaNoWriMo is essentially all of the best aspects of being a fictionwriter all rolled up into one – the writer is challenged with a specific timeframe and deadline, given support from a creative community, and thrown headlong into a self-motivating competition that will inevitably end with the competitor having written a novel, or at least having explored plot, character, dialogue, and backgrounder in enough depth to have the raw materials necessary to write one.
Further, win or lose, the networking of writers with each other – both for publishing reasons and for creative support and motivation – is something that cannot be taken lightly. NaNoWriMo is an excellent event for budding writers and for persons who want to make a committed effort to produce a work of fiction that perhaps, one day, will be published.
How Can Writers Get Involved?
Very simply, all one has to do to get involved with NaNoWriMo is to visit their website, join the forums, and get to writing the next great American (or Canadian, etc) novel! Whether one crosses the finish line or not as the month draws to a close or not, the old adage remains the same – nothing ventured, nothing gained!
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Nicholas Morine - Nicholas Morine Bachelor of Arts, English Language & Literature Master of Philosophy, Humanities (Candidate) Memorial University ...
