Slave of an outline

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Note: This message is from the outliners.com archive kindly provided by Dave Winer.

Outliners.com Message ID: 3793

Posted by pma
2005-08-17 17:26:08

I would like to discuss the use of outliners in the writing process. I’m doing my thesis, and made a huge and very detailed outline of the first two chapters, their sections, subsections, and ideas about what to write in each subsection. For months I’ve been filling on this outline, and lately, I’ve used Reference Manager to categorise my 400+ references according to the outline. So, I thought, NOW I can begin writing. But what happens? I can’t get it going. I see an entry in the outline, that I should write, but I’m just not inspired. Maybe because I’ve worked on the outline for so long, the issues have kind of become cold.

Then, today, I started writing, just freewriting, without caring much about structure, but following my argument through. And it felt like a liberation. I felt like in control again. The words had come alive, and I felt the entusiasm returning.

So, I started to wonder: Maybe its not such a great idea to make outlines. Maybe it goes contrary to human storytelling? Maybe we humans are better at telling stories in a linear way, developing an argument along the way?

I would be keen on hearing from members of this forum how you feel about this. Can you follow me? I still like the idea of outlining, producing text in a top-down fashion. But if it just doesn’t work…? How do you use outlines? Just as a guide, or do you actually “fill it in” with text? How does it contribute to the progression of drafts? I mean, is your first draft more finished if you have made an outline, then if you haven’t, so that you can make fewer revisions? Do you complete your outline before starting writing? Do you sometimes ammend your outline as a consequence of your writing?

Best regards,

Peter

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