In order to participate, writers must first register on the NaNoWriMo website (no participation fee required) where they can post profiles and information about their novels. According to its website, NaNoWriMo has almost 800,000 active novelists and almost 400,000 novels completed. That number multiplied to over 200,000 people by the 2010 event, who wrote a total of over 2.8 billion words. In July 1999, the project began with 21 participants. NaNoWriMo writers are encouraged to finish their first draft quickly, emphasizing on the length of the work rather than the quality, which can be edited later on. The website also provides participants, called 'Wrimos,” with tips for writer’s block, information on where local participants are meeting, and an online support community. Also, Hundreds of the startup’s volunteers organize communal writing sessions in thousands of partnering coffee shops, community centers, and libraries, to give NaNoWriMo participants a sense of communal belonging. Throughout the frantic writing process, acclaimed authors write 'pep-talks' to keep participating writers motivated. Therefore, NaNoWriMo has that aspect covered. However, much like Ernest Hemingway’s understated maxim on the psychic toll of writing, that there is “nothing to writing but sitting down at a typewriter and bleeding,” many writers also find the procedure of producing their perfect novel an overwhelming emotional turmoil. Organizers of the Internet-based event believe that the deadline boosts the writers’ urge to get their stories going and put words to paper, so to speak. To complete this deadline, they must write an average of approximately 1,667 words per day during this month. Every year, hundreds of thousands of people mark their calendars on the first day of November and begin their countdowns to its last, at which point these aspirant writers will have hopefully brought out the novel inside them.Īs noted, participants are expected to write a 50,000-word manuscript between during this one month period. National Novel Writing Month (often shortened to NaNoWriMo) is an annual Internet-based creative writing project that comes to life during the month of November. For the NaNoWriMo writers, however, it is the month in which they need to focus on delivering a brand-new novel by November 30th. This creativity is being celebrated all throughout November as part of National Novel Writers Month, a challenge as it were, now in its 20th year, for writers around the world to deliver a finished 50,000-word manuscript in one month.įor the rest of the world, November is the time for Thanksgiving, early Christmas shopping, and drinking spiced pumpkin lattes.

BEIRUT: “Sing, O Muse, of the rage of Achilles,” are the opening words of the famous Odyssey by Homer, a 3,000 year-old adventure story of the ancient Trojan Wars – and thus it is revealed - that even after centuries, writers, particularly novel writers, are often still in search of a muse, or at least a light-bulb moment, before they put fingers to keyboard.

November writing challenge