Anthony Trollope’s Work Ethic (Progress Report for January 12, 2020)

203,739 words in the manuscript. (Final draft goal: 180-190,000.) Currently editing chapter 16 of 67.

I was going to write a different kind of blog post today, the kind where I lament the fact that it’s Sunday afternoon and I didn’t accomplish much this weekend because I spent Friday, Saturday, and Sunday morning hanging out at the beach with friends.

I know, tough life, right??

I was going to complain about the fact that I don’t get as much work done as I would like, and that I hate my tendency to procrastinate, but I’ve written enough of those kinds of posts, so instead, I want to talk about this guy:

Meet Anthony Trollope

Anthony Trollope was a British novelist of the mid-19th century who was also a full-time postal worker. His writing career spanned about forty years, and he consistently put out at least one novel every year for 39 of those years.

Trollope was profiled in one of my all-time favorite books, Daily Rituals, which looks at the day-to-day routines of a whole host of famous authors, artists, musicians, and philosophers. The book started as a blog, so the profiles of each individual are quite short — generally only a page or two.

Trollope in particular stood out to me because he had a full-time job. Something most of us can relate to, I think.

Before going in to work each day, Trollope was up and at his writing desk by 5:30am. His goal was to produce ten pages, or roughly 2,500 words, each morning.

Toss out the stereotype of the messy, flighty artist.

In Daily Rituals, most of the writers, artists, and thinkers who were profiled did not fit the stereotypes that I think many of us have of a “creative.” Trollope is a good example; so was W.H. Auden. Both were disciplined like you would not believe — in bed early, up early, writing at precisely the same time each and every day, demanding a high level of accountability of themselves.

That is the sort of discipline I think it takes to produce good art.

I’m kind of tired of hearing people tell me that I’m too hard on myself.

I don’t know how many more years I have to write. I’m 41 now; I might die later tonight, in five years, or in fifty years. What I do know for sure is that time is limited, and I want to leave this lifetime having produced a body of work that I can be proud of and that other people find meaning and solace in.

Knowing how precious time is — the one resource that can never, ever be renewed — I want to take a page out of Anthony Trollope’s book and make each day at least as productive as the day before.

I get a little sick of people saying, “Yes, but you deserve a break!” when I tell them I wasn’t as productive as I had intended to be.

Shouldn’t we all be saying to each other instead, “Okay; what are you going to do tomorrow that will make it better than today?”

So here’s to being disciplined. Here’s to being a little hard on ourselves, and giving ourselves a kick in our own behind when we break promises to ourselves.

Here’s to Anthony Trollope’s 2,500 words before work each day (well done, sir, well done), and here’s to finishing Soldier of Dorsa’s major edits before February.