Instead of a review

 Nicholson Baker decided that he should try a new writing routine with every new book. 

What I’ve found with daily routines,” he said recently, “is that the useful thing is to have one that feels new. It can almost be arbitrary. You know, you could say to yourself, ‘From now on, I’m only going to write on the back porch in flip flops starting at four o’clock in the afternoon.’

 

I think this might be the most useful suggestion in Daily Rituals: How Artists Work. Routines can fossilize. If you’re stuck, some playful experimentation might help.

Instead of a review, a couple of remarks:

• The strongest overall impression: A lot of creative people have simple routines. “A thousand words before breakfast” might be all you need to know about Margaret Mead’s process.

• The passage that might make you question why you write: When Joseph Heller was writing Catch-22, he decided to give up. It would be better, he thought, to watch TV with his wife. After watching TV, Heller went back to his novel. He wondered what Americans were doing at night if they weren’t writing novels.

• Source: Mason Currey, Daily Rituals: How Artists Work: New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 2025. The quotation is on p. 68. Material on Margaret Mead is on p. 72. Joseph Heller’s crack is on p. 133.