Blogging purdah

Posted on July 21 2011

Having just put up several blogs before 8am it seems odd to say I might be going into blogging purdah, but needs must.

The Courageous State - my book to be published in September - is making good progress. 37,000 words are now done and the project is a month old. Those words are already being edited by the publisher, but that still leaves 23,000 plus to do - and some of the toughest to write at that.

So blogging may be a but on the thin side for the next week or so whilst I focus on cracking on with that. Even I'm beginning to think a book of this cale might be ambitious in six weeks or so.

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5 Responses

  1. Ivan Horrocks says:
    July 21 2011 at 9:15 am

    As someone who spends at least 50% of my time writing for a living I always thought your project was ambitious, Richard. That’s not so much to do with the number of words – you must write many thousands on this blog every week – but building and then maintining a sound and consistent argument. That – as I’m sure you know – will be the key to your Courageous State project. My own experience is that however well I think I’ve thought through a subject before I start writing it invariably turns out that there’s still lots more thinking to do. Luckily for me I work in an environment where I have an editor and external assessor who will both pick up on issues and weaknesses, but that all adds to the time it takes to complete a project. Given that the Courageous State will undoubtedly come under heavy scrutiny/attack from many it may well be that its better to take a bit more time on it than you and the published first planned.

    • Richard Murphy says:
      July 21 2011 at 9:29 am

      Ivan

      So far that’s not the problem – candidly, the thinking existed, but had never been written

      And once I work out a plan I’m rigorous in following it…

      I think ti will get there on time

      As for the criticism – of course it will attract a lot – but blogging life has prepared me for that. If it was a work of genius it would still attract the opprobrium of the right and I’ll say now, I’m sure this is a first stab at something to which i suspect I will return if there’s any merit in it

      I’m not worried about that prospect, or even admitting it in advance

      Remember in a different era re-writing a published work was considered quite acceptable – how many versions of the Wealth of Nations are there?

      Best

      Richard

      • Ivan Horrocks says:
        July 21 2011 at 11:13 am

        One things pretty certain, Richard, there were a lot less versions of stuff when it had to be written by hand 🙂

        Cheers

  2. syzygy says:
    July 21 2011 at 6:11 pm

    All the best Richard … I’m really looking forward to reading ‘The Courageous State’.