While a fascinating and inspiring insight into the thoughts and habits of the writers, I must confess to one disappointment. What the hell is Robert Caro doing away from his desk, and not continuing his writing the fourth volume of his "Years of Lyndon Johnson"! While I wait patiently, I don't want to see Mr Caro away from his desk in future until I have Volume Four in my hands.
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STROUT: You know, I'd put on a skirt and a matching top. It was very disconcerting. So I thought, well I should just stay home.
Do you all read your stuff out loud as you're going along?
BLOCK: No, I don't. I've heard that recommended and I've heard some people do that, but I think I hear it internally as I write it so I don't feel the need.
STROUT: I do sections at different points. Sound is very important to me, and also I have noticed that reading aloud is physically very exhausting, so I've learned that if I find that tiredness in myself, there's probably a sogginess in the prose.
ANDERSEN: I read dialogue aloud a lot. I wasn't aware that I was doing it until my children told me. [Laughter]
ORLEAN: I always do. I read everything and use it as a way of editing. In fact, when I do readings I find myself editing on the fly and thinking, ugh.
ANDERSEN: The other thing like this that I find interesting—and I guess it's a subtler thing—but the difference between reading what you've written on the screen and reading it printed out on paper. I find entirely new things that are wrong and that I need to change once I've printed it.
Why?
ANDERSEN: I don't know. It's a little bit, I guess, that your mind is focused, you're taking it more seriously on a certain level. It's not as though the hours I spent writing it on the screen were not. It's just like looking at it from a different angle.
STROUT: I will leave pages around the apartment to come upon by surprise. Like, what does this look like if I'm putting my earrings in and it's on the bureau and I have to turn. What does it look like if I come upon it? I've done that for years.
Is Bob the only person who uses a typewriter?
STROUT: I write by hand.
CARO: I write by hand for first drafts, and then I work using a typewriter.
STROUT: What kind of typewriter?
CARO: Smith Corona Electric 210, which they stopped making about 25 years ago, so you have to have this supply of typewriters cause if a key breaks you have to cannibalize another typewriter.
Discuss