Writing at the computer
by Emil Zopfi
"Do you type your texts directly into the computer?" I'm often asked. My usual answer is: "No, I write a rough draft by hand first." Which isn't completely true. More and more often I compose short, factual texts and journalistic pieces directly at the keyboard. But when it is a question of literature, of sound and feeling, of having to 'see' the story as I write, the machine gets in my way. At that point even the hum of the hard disk disturbs my inner images.
I had intended to key in this text direct, using the 'idea processor' of my word-processing program, which enables me to make an outline and then expand the single sections. The procedure, known as "top-down", was actually developed for writing computer programs. But literary texts cannot be created top-down - for that I need the flow of handwriting, the whisper of the pencil on paper. I need quiet surroundings and the right mood. At the machine I feel more like a technician or programmer.
Because my wife is at our computer just now, I'm writing the first draft of this article by hand. This will undoubtedly influence its structure and style. Maybe it will have more flow - swirl and eddy more. The tool alters the product, a banal observation in connection with hammers, files and computerized machine tools but comparatively unusual when applied to writing. Do texts tend to improve or suffer as a result of computers? That is the question. There will probably never be an answer as it won't be long until almost all writers are using computers. Nor has the question of how typewriters altered the form and contents of texts ever been answered. It can only be conjectured.
When John Steinbeck wrote East of Eden, he kept a log of the writing process. In The Journal of a Novel he describes the way he cultivated the work with pencils, checking the hardness of the leads, sharpening them until the writing tool felt right in his hand. Depending on his mood he changed pencils, occasionally using extra-soft ones because of the particular sensitivity they require.
Whether the keyboard allows particular sensitivity is doubtful, that it affects one's mood is indisputable. Perhaps it is true to say: the tool is the style. Clearly a keyboard can never afford the same flow as the free and easy movement of a pen or pencil. Hitting the keys uses different muscles, the brain and thought processes are stimulated differently. The function of motor activity during writing is one of the great unknowns of the creative process. What is certain is that movement, thinking and feeling are closely linked. As closely as tool and product.
When visual artists sketch knead, model or work canvas and paper, they do so with intense physical energy. Even graphic designers, who make intensive use of computers nowadays, draft their designs by hand. And architects reach for a soft pencil before feeding their designs into CAD computer systems. But ever since there have been (type)writing machines, there have been authors who are able to compose more fluently at the keyboard, who are disturbed by neither the rattling of mechanical parts nor the hum of an electric motor. I know a woman who can formulate only at the typewriter, and a teacher told me that he needed a computer to discover his gift for inventing stories. Perhaps the writing situation at the machine dispels writer's block because it neutralizes the negative 'I-haveto-write-a-composition' feeling inculcated at school. Correct sentences need not be produced immediately, at first go; corrections can be made at any time.
On the other hand, it took the American writer R. Rothenberg the first hundred pages of a book he was writing at the computer to notice that he was producing 'garbage'. He started work again - with a ball-point pen.
The writing process as a whole is very delicate and as yet comparatively unexplored. Only the rudiments of a theory exist. Whatever changes the computer may bring about, hardly anyone seems to be particularly concerned. Least of all writers, who are delighted with their new tool. No more tedious retyping of manuscripts since everything that has been keyed in is stored and can be retrieved at any time - barring operating errors. Making changes is as easy as pie - if the text is short and the passages to be edited few and far between. The publishing house receives the diskette along with the manuscript and even pays the author a supplementary fee for saving compositor's costs. All advantages that cannot simply be dismissed.
Everyone writes differently everyone has his own way of planning, developing and completing texts. Some may have a more top-down, programmerlike approach, others let the story flow. The literary form created in the process is ultimately a question of character, mood and organization. The Swiss author Silvio Blatter who has already written two novels at the screen, says: "I notice that this technology is very much in keeping with the way I think when I am writing. No novel evolves linearly from front to back. I leap back and forth, replace words, move whole passages, make subsequent additions and cuts, and for that the computer is the ideal aid."
The computer is undoubtedly a perfect tool for word-processing and text layout. I use it that way myself to great advantage. But even in that phase of writing all advantages are thrown away if a first draft is slipshod and careless, and the text subsequently requires protracted reworking. Too much editing smoothes down the rough edges of any text, making it bare and boring. If the first shot is no good, neither an idea processor nor the latest version of a word-processing program will help.
Copying is the greatest danger. Instead of writing a passage anew, which also means re-experiencing it, reliving it, the author simply retrieves it from somewhere, copies it in and polishes it up. Because the computer is such a powerful tool, ever more text of ever poorer quality is being produced, above all in the fields of non-fiction and journalism. Emphasis is shifting from creation to production. Works are constructed, built, patched, instead of dreamt, heard, seen.
But it's time for a confession. I've made abundantly good use of the copy option for this article too. My starting point was an approximately three-month-'old' text, which I retrieved to the screen. Then I added, deleted, copied inserted ... Do you notice anything? Maybe the original flow is gone, maybe everything is so solidly glued and well-polished that the breaks are no longer recognizable. But it is a completely different text than if I had sat down with pencil and paper and started afresh.
When I set up for myself as a freelance writer nine years ago, I bought an electric typewriter with ball and correction key. From then on I handed in beautiful manuscripts in courier type. Three years later I purchased my first PC. For a while I produced practically unreadable texts on a dot matrix printer. That typographic appearance, and not only literary form, is important is something I've learnt since I became involved in desktop publishing. Today I can produce readable manuscripts on the laser printer again; I can lay out book or magazine pages on the screen and give the diskettes to the printer as is. I must admit that these possibilities fascinate me. Recently I used my computer to prepare a friend's book of verse for the printer. From this perspective the computer reintroduces greater autonomy into the writer's workshop. Why not produce more independent publications for a small, interested, intimate readership? The possibilities of decentralization, of working locally rather than with mass publishing houses have definitely gained importance. New and interesting forms of literary publishing and distribution are going to emerge. Perhaps that is the most radical cultural change the computer will effect in the literary field.
But at what price? A somewhat adequate system is at least ten times as expensive as a good electric typewriter. I have to earn the money I need for that workplace. And my literary work may suffer as a result. Apart from questions of contents, I am expending more and more energy on typography and layout. I have developed great respect for the compositor's craft - something I had hardly paid any attention to before. My work as an author has become more all-encompassing: I accompany my text from first draft on paper to finished page, from pencil to computer set. As fascinating as that is, it is a burden as well. In any case, we won't be able to decide whether the computer is a better writing tool than the pencil until books like East of Eden have been composed at the keyboard. - For the moment we're still waiting.
Written 1989
Translated from the German by Eileen Walliser-Schwarzbart