Read. Write. Make art.

EduChoices has a posting today containing 50 of the Best Websites for Writers. They’ve got some of the best known, old-reliable resources on the Internet for writing.

Last night as I finished dinner, the thought came to me, “Your job is such a waste of your talents.”

I’ve had plenty of inspiration, and done plenty of thinking in my head, for not one, but two books.  Both of them are ideas that have been rolling around for quite a while.  Still, I have yet to commit more than a few pages of rough draft to paper for one, and nothing for the other one.

Feeling waspish and bored at work I decided to just ask the Oracle - Google - to server me up some web sites about writers, writing, and pens. We get:

• Writers.com
• Writers.net
• The Purdue Online Writing Lab
• Fiction writing on About.com
• PEN American Center
• Colorado Pen
• A Pen Lovers Paradise
• Swisher Pens

Of course there were a million more links on Google, but these were some that I thought may be worth looking at.  Who knows.  It seems to me that everyone and there brother who puts up a website these days is doing nothing but shilling for a buck.  It make me highly cynical of content that isn’t outright trying to sell something - like the pen stores online.

I confess I am a stylophile - someone who lovers pens.   The rub of it is that I am also cheap, and I have a strong tendency to lose things like pens.  Still, every time I go into an art supply store, or specialty shop that sells pens, I am intoxicated.  Now that I think about it - I must always have a pen near at hand.  I keep half a dozen on my desk, a couple in my car, some by my bed, some on the computer desk, some in the kitchen drawer.  I seem to be fearful of the instant of having a thought and not being able to commit it to paper.  None of these pens are expensive.  In fact, most of them were free.  I admit, as well, that I am a pen thief.  Oh, I would never steal the pen of a waiter or waitress, or of some other type of pen offered for use as a courtesy.  But I do take pens from hotel rooms, and the drug rep pens in doctor’s waiting rooms, and customized pens at the hair salon, etc.  My favorite pens seem to be the incredibly cheap Bic round stic med/moy in blue or black.

Last week (Friday evening) I finished Divine Comedies by Tom Holt. This was the first of his books that I had actually read. I had listened to his book In Your Dreams from Audible.com previously, and found it to be very funny and highly engaging. (I just went back to Audible now to try to find the book, and it looks like Audible no longer offers it for sale. What a pity.)

I had a hard time finding Holt’s work here in the United States. The publisher is Orbit Books. Of course, looking at their website, it appears that they have a highly confusing arrangement under which their authors are published by Orbit as an imprint of Hachette Book Group in the United States, and by Orbit as an imprint of Little, Brown Book Group in the United Kingdom. It appears that all of Orbit’s authors in the U.K., available through Little, Brown, are not available in the U.S. through Hachette. (This f’d up arrangement probably has something to do with not being able to purchase the book on Audible.com any longer as well.)

Divine Comedies, an omnibus edition containing two of Holt’s works, Here Comes the Sun and Odds and Gods, are pleasant diversions.  The writing isn’t as compelling as some of the other things I’ve been reading lately, nor as strong as Holt’s In Your Dreams, but the stories were fun.  Here Comes the Sun is slightly surreal in its narrative, which is only to be expected in a book encompassing all of time/space/creation.  I found the writing and use of language to be stronger than in Odds and Gods, though the plot was weaker than in that book.  The plot of Odds and Gods is more briskly paced and moves forward in  steady progression, while at times Here Comes the Sun seems almost elliptical in its narrative.  Holt’s writing is erudite and witty in an English sort of way, i.e., he makes references to classical literature and uses British (Welsh?) idioms.  Perhaps this is why his work has not been made more widely available in the United States.

A psychologist in Toronto at York University - Raymond A. Mar, M.A. - has posited that readers of fiction are more empathic than readers of non-fiction.

 Mar, R. A., Oatley, K., Hirsch, J., dela Paz, J., & Peterson, J. B. (2006). Bookworms versus nerds: The social abilities of fiction and non-fiction readers. Journal of Research in Personality, 40, 694-712.

I found the site GoodReads.com this afternoon.  It is completely addictive.  Wow.  I can (and did) spend hours adding books, perusing groups, clicking links.  The gist of it is that you create an account and then add the books you’ve read to it, or the ones you want to read.  You can then peruse books that other people are reading, read reviews, look at author profiles, check out groups of like minded readers, and I am sure all sorts of other stuff.

HarpersCollins Publishers has a website where you can “browse inside” a book before you buy it. The hope is that you’ll read some of a book online and then have to rush right out to Borders, Barnes and Noble, or Amazon to buy it. If you chose, and you have time - say you are sitting at work all day with nothing to do - you could read an entire book on-line. The selection of books is limited to those published by HarpersCollins, and then only a selection - well, okay, 11,556 books total. So enough to keep you busy for a while.  The site can be a bit cumbersome and unresponsive, especially navigating book titles and searching for content, but it is an impressive effort.

Prior to the rise of the widespread us of the PC, writing was generally done by hand, i.e., pen and paper. This would be the “old school” method.

Occasionally a movie portrays a “writer” sitting at an old style typewriter, pecking at the keys with the index finger on each hand. While I am sure that there were some writers who took this approach, it seems highly dubious that the majority of writers did their original compositions in such a tedious and painstaking manner.

When I was in high school and an undergraduate in college, all of our rough drafts and initial revisions were done by hand. Resources in computer labs were too precious to allow people to sit and stare blankly at a screen as they tried to compose a first draft. Of course, printing at that time also cost five cents per page and was done on an incredibly noisy dot matrix. I don’t miss those days. I have many fond memories of those computer labs, and I am also thankful for the rise in ubiquity of computers in education. In almost every class I attend now, laptop computers are in front of the majority of students - easily 75-80% - during class. The computer labs still exist, but they are usually in use by students using highly specialized software that only the school has, or by students who want to quickly check their e-mail or make a quick change and print out a paper before class.

I don’t want to diminish or ignore the reality of the “digital divide.” I attend Metropolitan State University in the evenings. Metro State draws students from a very diverse economic, racial, age, and cultural background. I am aware that access to a computer at home or work for all students can not be assumed. It is becoming more and more the reality that computers are required to participate in higher education, however that should not be an additional entry barrier for those already facing obstacles in pursuing their education. It is encouraging that prices for entry level computers capable of Internet browsing and word processing have dropped so low as to be comparable to the cost of a couple of college text books. Additionally, technology has matured to the point where “second hand” computers, those as young as 3 to 5 years old or older, are quite prevalent. A computer that is four years old can generally run a web browser or word processor without any trouble.

Now, to the “Tools of the Trade.” I will leave pen and paper for a separate consideration. Today I will consider specific tools for writing. I will consider programs available to most individuals, on common platforms.

Installed Software

• Bank Street Writer - This one is almost as “old school” as pen and paper. I throw it in just for nostalgia sake, and because it was one of the first word processors I ever used. I got a ton of mileage out of it. You can perhaps find a copy of it on eBay for PC. I found a copy available for download online, but it is a version for a Commodore64 and requires a C64 emulator to run on PC. One of the great things about BSW is that it reminds me that writing is all about the text. You don’t need a fancy word processor or high powered computer to get the job done.

• WordPerfect - This is the grand daddy of modern word processors. It was the standard for quite a while, and lingered in highly specialized fields, such as law, until being supplanted by Microsoft Office Word. It is still available, in a modern version, and is competitively priced at $99 for a student version of Corel WordPerfect Office suite. I don’t know anyone who actually uses it. Personally, I think it’s time for Corel to put it in the public domain and just give it away. I would wager adoption would be a lot higher, and they could use it as a lead in to the products in which they have a core competency.

• Microsoft Works - a productivity suite by Microsoft scaled for the home. Includes a word processor. Ships with most computers that are sold with a Microsoft Operating System. Odds are that if you have bought a PC with a version of Windows on it, it is already installed. I’ve never used it to do anything, but it’s been around forever.

• Microsoft Word 97/2003/XP/2007 - The king of word processors; the standard by which all other word processors are measured. This product does not dominate the market because it is perfect. It dominates because of Microsoft’s genius vision to create a suite of integrated products, and deliver them in a way that was cost effective (relatively speaking). When Lotus Notes was the spreadsheet of choice, and WordPerfect the dominant player in the word processor area, MS came along and bundled two adequate but not superlative alternates and stomped them both. Pair the product with the sales of a Microsoft Operating System, and you get an unstoppable behemoth. “Word” has become synonymous with “word processor” in much the way “Kleenex” has become synonymous with “tissue.” And, if you buy a computer with Microsoft Office pre-installed, off the top you are adding another $149 to $249 to the cost. The product has changed little from the ‘97 version until the 2007 version, which changed the entire UI. I’ve used this product at every job I’ve been at, and I am an old pro at it. Still, I won’t pay for it when there are comparable alternatives.

• OpenOffice - The alternative to Microsoft Office. OpenOffice is open source, and free (as in beer). OpenOffice’s development process has a long and somewhat interesting history as being an open source initiative supported by Sun, who sold a version of the product for a time as StarOffice. StarOffice has been merged into OpenOffice, however, and is now completely open source as they are one product. The beauty of OpenOffice, aside from being free, is that it looks and acts in a manner so similar to other word processors that the learning curve is almost nil. It is true that the OpenOffice suite does not have all the functionality as some of the more complex features of Microsoft Office, however OpenOffice is in constant development. Further, OpenOffice is available in a variety of ports for Mac and Linux as well as PC. OpenOffice is what I use as much as possible. I use it exclusively at home, and try to get away with using it at work. Highlights include being able to print directly to PDF (my Microsoft Office 2003 at work can’t do that), and having the Open Document Format for saving documents. Did I mention it is free?

• IBM Lotus Symphony - An office suite based on OpenOffice, mentioned above. IBM Lotus Symphony has a somewhat slicker look and feel to it then OpenOffice, but essentially the same functionality. Free, as well, though requires an annoying registration with IBM to download.

• Abi Word - I have not actually used the Abi Word product much. However, it is very popular as a Microsoft Word alternative for the Linux platform. From what I have seen of it, the product is fast and capable. It is available for a very wide range of hardware and operating system configurations.

• AppleWorks - AppleWorks was a product bundled with Apple computers, much like MicrosoftWorks with PCs. It included a basic word processing application. AppleWorks was discontinued by Apple, though support is still available on Apple’s AppleWorks website.

• Pages - Part of the iWorks software suite by Apple. Runs only on Apple computers. Pages is my favorite word processor. It is worth buying a Mac simply to use Pages as your word processor. The interface is clean, with “drawers” that can be opened to display formatting and application options. Using this product, you feel like this is the way software is “meant” to be. It is an actual pleasure to use; Pages is a product that changes the way people experience the process of word processing. The iWorks suite by Apple, which includes Pages, is $79 for an individual license, or $99 for a family license (up to five computers). This is a much more reasonable price for a far superior product than Microsoft Office Student Edition at $149.

Internet based word processors

• Google Docs - There has been a lot of talk about Google’s strategy in creating (actually buying the online word processor Writely) Google Docs. Word on the street is that Google wants to challenge Microsoft’s dominance in the Office Suite space. If that is true, it as a ways to go. I like Google Docs a lot. It has some great things going for it. Of all the Internet based office suites, it is the one that feels the most portable and accessible from any computer, anywhere, regardless of platform. All you need is a web browser. I like the document manager. It is very easy to just jump right in and create a document - just start typing. The interface is fast and lightweight. There is functionality to print or save in a number of different formats, including PDF, ODF, and DOC. There is offline functionality with Google Gears (though I haven’t tried it yet). Google Docs supports posting to a blog from within the application. File sharing and collaboration is superlative. Google Docs ties into your existing gMail account. There is so much that I like about Google Docs, that it seems a bit uncharitable to nit-pick. However, my qualms with Google Docs have to do with the fact that the product just doesn’t feel quite “finished.” Google Docs does indicate that it is “Beta” software. I appreciate that. It feels like the application needs a little more polish on the user interface, functionality of some of the buttons/toolbar layouts, and mouse functionality. Google Docs does keep improving, and adding new content, and it has improved a lot since I started using it about a year ago.

• Zoho - Some people swear by Zoho - claiming it to be the best of the Internet based office suites. It has probably the widest range of features available among the Internet based products. The reason I can’t get into Zoho is a little irrational. I hate its logo. The building blocks thing makes me feel like it is an immature and childish product. I also think it’s a rather stupid name. Finally, I find their website ugly, and it really turns me off.

• ThinkFree - Another online office suite. ThinkFree has positioned itself most aggressively to be an alternative to Microsoft Office. The product looks very clean and professional. It is well developed with a lot of functionality. I don’t have a lot of quibbles with ThinkFree, but the one I did have was large. At home, I could never get ThinkFree to run with my Java Runtime installation in Firefox. This essentially precluded me from using the more advanced editor. I finally got a Java 6 JRE installed and that seemed to resolve the issue, but it was frustrating. At times the UI can feel a little bulky and clumsy. Finally, there is no ability to save documents in the ODF format. ThinkFree is leveraging itself in direct competition with Microsoft Office, and doesn’t seem to want to be associated with OpenOffice or the open source movement. There is a Premium Online version available with an offline client for download, as well as a server edition, and portable editions. The online version of the product is free, as well as the Premium offline beta edition, however other versions (Server, Desktop, Portable) will cost you some money. The product is Java based, so is platform independent. Despite my quibbles with it, ThinkFree is what Google Docs wants to be. It looks good, and feels like a professional, mature product.

• Buzzword - This latest entry comes from Adobe software. The application looks gorgeous. Much like Pages is the stand alone word processor to beat, Buzzword changes the playing field of Internet based word processing. Like Pages, Buzzword changes the way one experiences a word processor. The functionality is adequate, though not as robust as ThinkFree or Google Docs. However it blows both of them out of the water in terms of user experience. It is quite simply a pleasure to use Buzzword. Within the past few months, the functionality of the application has increased, especially with being able to save to your own computer, and a variety of print functionality.

Quasi word processors/text editors

• TextPad - Sometimes you need to write something quick and dirty. Or, there are instances where formatting would simply get in the way of the text. When all you need is the text itself, you want a functional alternative to the dismal Notepad and clumsy Wordpad provided by Microsoft. TextPad is a great text editor. It is so powerful that it also can double as a rudimentary word processor as well. It shines in things like find and replace, fast saves, and saving text in a small file format. Textpad is not open source, but is priced at $33, with volume discounts available. The download is free, and there are no limitations in the program, but there is a “nag” pop-up after the initial evaluation period to ask you to purchase a license.

Summary

There are of course a ton more products out there for word processing. These are just some of my favorites, or the most significant. My recommendations go to Pages by Apple as stand alone word processor. If you don’t have a Mac, then go with OpenOffice or IBM Lotus Symphonie (essentially the same thing). For a web based word processor, I select Buzzword, though Google Docs takes a very close second. Finally, Textpad is a text editor that I can’t live without for fast text manipulation or data entry.

I’ve come to realize I only want to do three things with my life.

1. Read
2. Write
3. Make art.