Re: TW vs. creativity

[Elna Tymes <etymes -at- LTS -dot- COM>]

Chris -
>
> I've often though it would be much easier to write novels than doc.  Less
> restrained by budgets, facts, tool problems, ethics questions, undocumented
> features, updates and patches, audience expectations, looming release
> dates, etc. etc.

Grass always looks greener on the other side of the fence, doesn't it?

If you simply want to write a novel, you can do it when and where you
like, regardless of budgets, deadlines, etc.  However, if you want to
get it PUBLISHED, you do have to face budgets, deadlines, editors who
want you to rewrite sections, etc.  The players may be different, but
the constraints are quite similar.

Jean Auel and many others who went from tech writing to careers as
novelists have noted that the discipline is pretty much the same, though
the skills are a little different.  Tech writers don't have to worry
about plots and subplots, character development, enough sex and romance
to keep the reader interested, etc.  Novelists don't have to worry about
GUIs changing up to the last minute.  Tech writers generally have
dependable incomes.  Novelists who make it big can usually tell you of
the years when they struggled; novelists who don't make it big don't
usually speak up, so you don't notice them.

Elna Tymes
Los Trancos Systems

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