1. Follow Gilles Deleuze's advice to help Félix Guattari overcome frantic activity and writer's block: send out a draft or diagram of all your ideas without any secondary revision or organization at the end of every single day, no matter what. (if you're interested in the conditions of their collaboration, check them out @ http://cup.columbia.edu/book/978-0-231-14560-2/gilles-deleuze-and-flix-guattari.
2. Ask smart people besides your advisor to read over your work and help you sort your ideas in the best way possible--consider Jon, Ben, David, or others, in addition to your advisors and other professors that know you.
3. Always put your priority on research concerning as directly as possible your chosen topic before moving on to anything like psychoanalysis or pleasure reading.
4. Keep strict hours and take breaks, yo. Five to eight hours of work means 25-60 minute total break-time.
5. In times of intellectual crisis, remember: "Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax and wait for the answer." -W. Burroughs
In other words, you can only force things so much before you wear yourself out and lose the receptive capacities vital to careful observation and creative thought in the first place. Further, "Thinking always happens behind the thinker's back."
6. Think about using voice recordings or video, particularly when you have thoughts but no notebooks--only your phone.
2. Ask smart people besides your advisor to read over your work and help you sort your ideas in the best way possible--consider Jon, Ben, David, or others, in addition to your advisors and other professors that know you.
3. Always put your priority on research concerning as directly as possible your chosen topic before moving on to anything like psychoanalysis or pleasure reading.
4. Keep strict hours and take breaks, yo. Five to eight hours of work means 25-60 minute total break-time.
5. In times of intellectual crisis, remember: "Your mind will answer most questions if you learn to relax and wait for the answer." -W. Burroughs
In other words, you can only force things so much before you wear yourself out and lose the receptive capacities vital to careful observation and creative thought in the first place. Further, "Thinking always happens behind the thinker's back."
6. Think about using voice recordings or video, particularly when you have thoughts but no notebooks--only your phone.
Second: A passage detailing D&G's writing process, from the link provided above:
"Guattari’s companion Arlette Donati told him about Deleuze’s concerns. Their first book was written primarily through letters. This approach to writing completely upset Guattari’s daily life, because it forced him to work alone, which was not his habit, as he had been used to directing his groups. Deleuze expected Guattari to wake up and get to his desk right away, to outline his ideas on paper (he had three ideas per minute), and, without rereading or reworking what he had written, to mail his daily draft. He imposed what he considered to be a necessary process for getting over writer’s block. Guattari followed the rules faithfully and withdrew into his office, where he worked slavishly until four o’clock in the afternoon every day, after which he went to La Borde to quickly make his rounds before returning to Dhuizon, generally around six o’clock. Jean Oury felt abandoned: Guattari had been omnipresent in the daily life of La Borde but was now devoting himself to his work with Deleuze. Arlette Donati even brought him his lunch every day because he did not stop working to eat.
For the most part, the writing plan for Anti-Oedipus was that Guattari sent his texts to Deleuze, who then reworked them for the final version. “Deleuze said that Félix was the diamond miner and he was the polisher. So he needed only to send him the texts as he wrote them and he would work on them; that’s how it went.” Their common endeavor relied far more on epistolary exchange than on dialogue, although they did meet at Deleuze’s house every Tuesday afternoon, the day that Deleuze taught his morning course at Vincennes. On good days, Deleuze came to Guattari, but he avoided the unbearable madness at La Borde. “One day, Félix, Arlette Donati, Gilles, and I were eating at Dhuizon and we got a call from La Borde saying that a guy had set fire to the chateau chapel and run off into the woods. Gilles blanched, I froze, and Félix called for help to find the guy. At that point, Gilles said to me, ‘How can you stand those schizos’? He couldn’t bear the sight of crazy people."
For the most part, the writing plan for Anti-Oedipus was that Guattari sent his texts to Deleuze, who then reworked them for the final version. “Deleuze said that Félix was the diamond miner and he was the polisher. So he needed only to send him the texts as he wrote them and he would work on them; that’s how it went.” Their common endeavor relied far more on epistolary exchange than on dialogue, although they did meet at Deleuze’s house every Tuesday afternoon, the day that Deleuze taught his morning course at Vincennes. On good days, Deleuze came to Guattari, but he avoided the unbearable madness at La Borde. “One day, Félix, Arlette Donati, Gilles, and I were eating at Dhuizon and we got a call from La Borde saying that a guy had set fire to the chateau chapel and run off into the woods. Gilles blanched, I froze, and Félix called for help to find the guy. At that point, Gilles said to me, ‘How can you stand those schizos’? He couldn’t bear the sight of crazy people."
In other words, I'll be writing during routine hours every weekday, often on weekends as well, after swimming or stretching, except in the event of extraordinarily extenuating circumstances, such as the loss of my excruciatingly loud alarm clock, illness, or some sort of special appointment, and I'll post my writing or notes at a regular time (probably around 5 or 6 p.m.).
If you've any inclination to provide helpful comments or casual critique please feel free to check the blog and post at any time you feel like. Passing interest in my writing process with nothing to add is perfectly admissible as well.
Much thanks in advance for any interest or comment provided.
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