Plotter, pantser or a little mixture of both…which are you?
Or are you reading this and wondering what I’m talking about.
I didn’t know I was pantser. I learned my identity long after the fact. In this regard, I liken myself to a black widow spider.
Not because I mate and kill. I’m referring to the web. If you’ve ever touched a black widow’s web, you recognize it immediately by touch alone. But they are also distinguished by the seemingly helter-skelter designs. It may appear as though there is no rhyme or reason to their construction.
Being a pantser which means writing by the seat of ones pants is like that. A pantser builds a story with threads that may not seem to connect in a meaningful way. Often I don’t have a clue why I added something to a story. However, I’ve learned to leave what I don’t understand alone…in due time all will be revealed.
The construction of a plotter is like a beautiful ornate web, well-arranged and orderly. Plotter are precise, with well thought out outlines, graphs, notes, stickies, and the list of anal-anomalies can go on and on. (That’s snark born of jealous envy.)
I’ve heard some plotters speak of having outlines with a goodly number of pages. I heard a well-known author at a workshop say that her outline can be seventy pages. They might even have a bible for their series. These are things I’ve heard, but never experienced.
I’ve tried to plot.
When I first read Debra Dixon’s Goal, Motivation and Conflict I decided that I needed to plot to give a more desirous result to my writing experience. All I got for my effort was bored. I can’t write the book if I already know what’s going to happen. That takes the fun out of it for me. The adventure of discovery is missing.
So does that mean I’m left with an ugly misshapen web of words? The poor black widow’s 
web may not be appreciated because people are quick to destroy the little creatures before they construct their creation. The webs often look meager with little to recommend them other than their unique strength and resilience.
But left to mature in a place where the spider doesn’t have to fight to live, the web has its own appeal.
So I’ve learned not to worry about being a pantser. And if a strange, off the track sentence works it’s way into my story it doesn’t worry me now. I know I’ll discover the reason it’s there. It will be a delightful surprise and once again I’ll be in wonder of the workings of the strange mind God gave me.
Remember this is all…as I see it…
Brit, I am a pantser. I agree with everything you say. To me the fun of writing is discovering the story as I go. I read an article in Writer’s Digest last year that was an interview with James Lee Burke. Burke said that when he sits down to write each day, he has two scenes in mind. No more. No less. He writes those two scenes and comes back the next day and writes the two scenes that come to him, and so forth until he finishes the book. That sounds very familiar to me, except that I usually just have one scene in mind. I suppose that is why I am at best half the writer James Lee Burke is.
Sometimes I don’t even have an entire scene, so I’m one-fourth the writer James Lee Burke is.
I could do this all day, Stephen. Is there anyone else I can be a fraction of?
I love this post! I, too, am a pantser, lol. In most other areas of my life, I am pretty organized, neat, and OCD, but when it comes to writing, I have no plans. I just write when it comes to me. If I try to plan, then I end up writing what I want instead of what the characters want and that never works. I usually have a basic idea of where the story is going but the particulars always surprise me. It was reassuring and gratifying to read this, knowing that someone who has written and published many books isn’t all that different from me when it comes to writing.
I’m a bit of both. I like to know where I’m starting, where I’m expecting to end up, and a few bits in the middle. Then I let the characters take me along for the ride. Like you, I leave well enough alone and sometimes I’m amazed at how those unlikely scenes come together into a final story. I’ve even been known to go, “wow, I wish I’d thought of that.”
Love the spider web analogy. So right.
Greta, I get the same feeling as if I didn’t write what I’m reading. Sometimes when I have to read something I’ve written a long time ago, I’m so surprised. I’ll know the basics of the story, but there are always bits and pieces that make me feel like someone else wrote it. I think it’s like Jade says…the characters write the story.
Jade, there are a bunch of us!
I’m with you the whole way honey! I can only fly by the seat of my pants! I too tried to outline once, threw it out and started over. I then proceeded to write, edit and turn the book in with in 2 1/2- 3 months. Thing and details just come as I’m typing, even if I’m away from my laptop and jot down scenes in a notebook, when I go to type something always changes or is twisted around somehow that I didn’t see before. So you and I will stick together and let the world of organized plotters be, it’s more fun our way! LMAO
Good to know I’m not alone.
I write the story I see in my head…and unfortunately, I start off with core scenes (often in no particular order.) The rest sort of fill themselves in along the way. I think of the core scenes as the contribution by the plotter part of me. What happens in between is the pantser’s contribution.
That said, I’ve had an entire series get hijacked by a character, so obviously, the plotter is not winning out…