
Isaac Asimov on How to Be Prolific - bgroat
http://briangroat.com/2016/10/26/asimov-on-how-to-be-prolific/
======
laacz
I must say "Thank you". Thank you, Asimov, for my language skills.

I started reading Asimov in my native language (Latvian) until I run out of
it. It was late 80s. Then I had to work on my Russian reading skills in order
to read everything else USSR had to provide from Asimov. Then I read
everything libraries in Riga had on sci-fi.

And when 90s arrived, I accidentally got a hold of few Asimov books in
English. I remember vividly the nights I spent with his book on the left side
and English dictionary on the right one. Underlining and writing words and
page numbers of words I coulnd't find just to return to them later when
context would be much cleaner. Ever so funny struggle with idioms and cultural
references I couldn't possibly understand. There was no internet to look that
stuff up.

So, yes. Thank you, sci-fi in general and Asimov in particular for motivation
and opportunity to learn one of basic life skills - ability to read and
understand foreign language better than school could teach.

~~~
leonroy
> I remember vividly the nights I spent with his book on the left side and
> English dictionary on the right one. Underlining and writing words and page
> numbers of words I coulnd't find just to return to them later when context
> would be much cleaner. Ever so funny struggle with idioms and cultural
> references I couldn't possibly understand. There was no internet to look
> that stuff up.

I salute your perseverance and skill - that's incredible.

We take for granted how easily we now obtain the information and literature we
want today (tailored to our preferences at that!) thanks to the internet.

In some ways I feel we had to use our brains more before technology and data
became so universal and cheap!

~~~
TeMPOraL
> _In some ways I feel we had to use our brains more before technology and
> data became so universal and cheap!_

Maybe. Funny thing is, we have more opportunity to use our brains better now,
and yet it seems we're not taking it.

For instance, books. Many people say that they don't read much books anymore -
even though today you have access to much _better_ selection of books than
before. Issues like being an adult = lots of bullshit errands aside, it's easy
to be distracted by blogs and other short-form texts today. I have to
constantly remind myself to keep reading actual books. Today you can literally
just Google "best book on X", browse several discussion threads and pick out
what is possibly the best resource whole humanity has on topic X. It's that
easy. But for some reason, it's not an obvious thing to do. It wasn't for me
until recently.

------
SwellJoe
It's interesting that Asimov offered advice that suggests writing without
concern for whether everything fit together; just getting the first draft out
was the goal. This somewhat conflicts with Asimov's own style of writing
(which he talked about in at least one of his three memoirs, as well as other
places), which was effectively to write the final draft the first time. He was
not prone to heavy editing after writing, and was also not prone to editing
while writing. So, he was basically just writing and handing it off to his
editor/publisher (and I think it's also been established that his editors also
had a soft touch with his work).

So, maybe he was just being kind enough to not hold everyone to his own
standards. And, maybe he developed his skill for writing without a net through
tremendous amounts of practice (more practice than almost every other human
who ever lived...he's among the most prolific book authors the world has
seen).

Anyway, I read everything about Asimov I come across. But, this is kinda
blogspammy. Asimov's own memoirs are worth a read. I have not read Janet
Asimov's books about Asimov, yet, but surely will eventually.

Also, this site breaks the back button for me in Firefox. That's gross, and I
literally hate every person who's ever intentionally broken basic browser
functionality for profit, ego, or whatever reason they thought made it OK.

~~~
SyneRyder
I agree the site is blogspammy, but is the back button a Firefox issue? I
tried the site in Safari & Chrome as well and there's no issues with the back
button there, only in Firefox.

~~~
SwellJoe
The back button in Firefox works fine on sites that don't fuck with the back
button. So...no, I don't think we can reasonably blame Firefox.

Firefox has a reasonable implementation of the History API, so it isn't that
Firefox doesn't support some feature that a single page app would need in
order to make stuff like URLs work right. And, it's not like Firefox is some
obscure browser with 1% of market share.

------
michaelpinto
Something to keep in mind is that Asimov was very much a product of the age of
pulp magazines, so early on in his career he was paid by the word for his
work.

A side geek note: If you were active in NYC fandom from say the 50s on chances
were very good that you would actually get to see Isaac in person at many
local science fiction conventions. For some reason he disliked air travel, and
would show up at almost any local convention that he was invited to.

If you want to read a really good book on being a geek from the depression era
to about the 50s I would highly recommend reading The Way the Future Was by
rederik Pohl.

~~~
mromanuk
He had fear of flying, I remember reading that in one of his autobiographical
books. He was aware of that and wrote a lot about space travel, on the cave of
steel he depicted humans as being agarophobic

~~~
teddyh
That’s “agoraphobic”.

------
johnwheeler
A lot of us are prolific makers, we're just not prolific sharers. I've amassed
a ton of bitbucket repos the world has never seen. Now, I'm learning to share
my work and focus on marketing in conjunction with development.

I wrote a piece last night about it:

[https://blog.oldgeekjobs.com/be-a-prolific-
sharer-31bfdfb50a...](https://blog.oldgeekjobs.com/be-a-prolific-
sharer-31bfdfb50a40)

It's about not being afraid to share the things you make and tuning them until
they resonate with your audience.

~~~
shorttime
That's kind of funny you should say that. A book I'm currently reading
advocates that our best writers of today's day and age won't be those on the
internet that share their work easily but instead hidden away, released to
small groups of audiences. One such forum referenced was TOR and Darknet.

~~~
johnwheeler
That sounds interesting. How does the book argue that quality of work
correlates with availability and audience size? What book is it?

~~~
LanceH
It's a small book for a select audience :)

~~~
kjdal2001
I think hes talking about "But What If We're Wrong?" by Chuck Klosterman.
Sorry to spoil the secret!

edit: Its highly recommended. Also, its not an argument about quality. The
author speculates about what kind of art produced in the present day that
people in the future will value.

~~~
shorttime
Yep, that's the book! Good find.

------
biofox
With regards to mortality as a motivator, I often find the opposite to be
true. When I am reminded of death or illness, I usually end up falling into a
spiral of procrastination -- anything to avoid the thought of oblivion. I find
it to be quite a major source of time wastage and I suspect I'm not alone in
this.

When Asimov was unwell following bypass surgery, James Randi wrote that Asimov
fell into a depression and gave up writing altogether [1], presumably for the
same reason.

[1]
[http://www.skepticfiles.org/atheist/asimovob.htm](http://www.skepticfiles.org/atheist/asimovob.htm)

~~~
biofox
I'd be interested to know if anyone has advice on how to break out of these
thought patterns.

~~~
mmariani
Set goals and go about pursuing them. It requires discipline but once you
surpass the initial blocks it becomes second nature. Also, don't forget of
yourself. Do some form of physical activity and set some goals for that too.
Rinse and repeat.

~~~
faitswulff
Regarding goals, I've personally found them to be counterproductive unless
they're simply achieved and a matter of habit. For instance, "go to the gym
and do nothing" became "go to the gym and walk on the treadmill" when I became
habituated to showing up at the gym. Now I'm lifting regularly and I feel off
if I don't get a chance to go work out.

Audacious goals, on the other hand, are demotivating because there's too much
chance of failure. If I hold myself to lifting certain weights, I may even end
up getting injured. But now I'm happy simply showing up, doing what I have the
capacity for, whether it's walking, stretching, or lifting. I can (and will)
come back if I have an off day.

Scott Adams talks about something similar in Goals vs Systems[1]. A goal of
writing a book is much harder to achieve than a goal of typing a little bit in
the morning. Ironically, the latter may be the best route to the former...as
long as you don't think about it too much :)

[1]: [http://blog.dilbert.com/post/102964992706/goals-vs-
systems](http://blog.dilbert.com/post/102964992706/goals-vs-systems)

------
Matachines
I stand by the idea proposed by Cal Newport that the best way to do great work
is to do "Deep Work"—large (but not all day) amounts of no-distraction, in-
the-zone work. Harder to do than ever, but when I can do it I'm amazed.

~~~
newfolder
Deep work isn't a new concept. I just finished Cal's book and, while it's a
decent read, I didn't learn anything.

Maybe because I read a lot of productivity-based articles and blog posts?

~~~
Matachines
How about trying to actually do it? I agree self-help books are mostly fluff
that can be said in half the length, but I do think "Deep Work" is a useful
technique.

One problem I did have with the book was that Deep Work might not be useful
for someone whose work is largely mechanical or mundane, though in that case
I'd apply Deep Work to learn skills to into more interesting jobs if one
wishes.

------
Lio
FTA:-

    
    
      “So what if it limps. Its purpose is to get you into the next stage of the
      story and you take off from there. Time enough when you go through the novel
      again to correct the transition. For all you know, the material that you will
      write much later in the novel will make it plain to you exactly how the
      transition ought to have been. No amount of rewriting and repolishing now will
      get it right in the absence of knowledge of the course of the entire book. So
      let it limp and get on with it … Think of yourself as an artist making a sketch
      to get the composition clear in his mind, the blocks of color, the balance, and
      the rest. With that done, you can worry about the fine points.”
      – Asimov’s advice, in a letter, about ‘limping transitions’ in first drafts
    

This would seem to be good advice in any creative endeavour and particularly
relevant to startup culture.

------
babesh
His older novels such as the later Foundation series were crap. Fad idea of
the day (Gaia) instead of exploring a topic a bit more in depth (advantages of
large populations in combating stasis). His best work was his early short
stories (three laws of robotics, ultimate question). IMHO, his quality
gradually went down before falling off a cliff. Traded quantity for quality?

~~~
rootbear
I'm as big an Asimov fan as anyone, but I generally agree that his later
novels were weaker. He set himself the challenge of merging the Robot universe
with the Foundation universe and I'm not sure it was a good idea. I have
always said that his short stories were his best work. I recently heard the
radio adaptation of "Hostess" and was reminded was a great story that is.

I was a fan of his science essays before I read his fiction. I taught myself
physics via those essays before I learned it in High School. But even more
importantly, I learned how to think like a scientist. I owe him a huge debt of
gratitude for that, which, fortunately, I was able to express to him once in
person.

~~~
Animats
Yes, although he wrote over 400 books, most of the good ones were in the first
100.[1] There were a lot of junk books in the later years. That happens to
working writers.

At least Asimov didn't get stuck writing movie tie-ins. Some good SF writers
have had to write movie tie-in novels to pay the rent. Alan Dean Foster, who
wrote some excellent novels in his own universes, has ground out too many Star
Dreck, Star Wars, Alien, Terminator, and Transformers tie-ins.

[1]
[http://www.asimovonline.com/oldsite/asimov_titles.html](http://www.asimovonline.com/oldsite/asimov_titles.html)

------
orf
90,000 letters is equal to 4 a day for 61 years. That's a superhuman output

~~~
kleer001
It's amazing what people can get up to if they're not being distracted by the
internet or other popular media.

~~~
jcoffland
That's just an excuse. Most people back in the good old days didn't get up to
much either.

~~~
kleer001
Most people, sure. But they weren't going to do great works anyways.

It's the exceptional ones are more likely these days to be eaten up by
transitory media along with everyone else.

But who knows. It's all speculation from me. There's no ethical way to run the
experiment.

------
Procrastes
Cached version here:
[http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:VMbrnBW...](http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:VMbrnBWdtncJ:briangroat.com/2016/10/26/asimov-
on-how-to-be-prolific/+&cd=1&hl=en&ct=clnk&gl=us)

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seesomesense
Issac Asimov's later works are known to have been ghostwritten. Hiring other
writers to write under your byline is the easiest way to be prolific.

------
protonpopsicle
The "Candy Store" this article refers to (and Asimov in the quote) is in my
neighborhood. Hilariously I discovered this through Pokémon Go.

~~~
protonpopsicle
Its no longer a candy store of course.

------
ars
> expanding a short story about a collapsing universe, and expand it into a
> novel.

What story is this? When I google it I get non-fiction links.

~~~
viewer5
I believe it's "The Gods Themselves", though Wikipedia doesn't have anything
about it starting as a short story (at least skimming on my phone)

~~~
rukuu001
I was thinking that's exactly what it sounded like, which is my hands-down
favourite Asimov book.

~~~
jholman
That's because it's the _best_ Asimov book. :P

~~~
gpderetta
Pfff, The End of Eternity is obviously the best Asimov book :)

edit: and probably the best time travel novel as well

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doodpants
I can't quite put my finger on why, but I suspect that this guy wants people
to subscribe to his newsletter.

~~~
duderific
I'll pass on the newsletter signup. His writing is less than stellar; there
are all kinds of fragment sentences which make the article difficult to read.

~~~
GavinMcG
Maybe his other stuff isn't as bad.

... Nope. No other stuff. This is literally the only thing on the site and
there are three "Join now!" boxes.

~~~
inimino
Based on the topic of his first post, I am sure we can expect many, many more
to come.

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grillvogel
step one: grope everyone you see

~~~
cairo_x
You're thinking of Arthur C. Clarke (pedo).

~~~
grillvogel
thats wrong. but asimov was a notorious lech at conventions

~~~
cairo_x
In his own words:

"I have never had the slightest interest in children – boys or girls. They
should be treated in the same way. But once they have reached the age of
puberty, then it is OK," Mr Clarke was quoted as saying in the Sunday Mirror.
"If the kids enjoy it and don't mind it doesn't do any harm … there is a
hysteria about the whole thing in the West."

Mr Clarke subsequently denied he was a paedophile, saying: "The allegations
are wholly denied." But he never sued the Sunday Mirror and died aged 90 at
his Sri Lanka home in 2008.

Source: [http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/notw-editor-
sp...](http://www.independent.co.uk/news/media/press/notw-editor-spiked-
paedophilia-scoop-on-arthur-c-clarke-for-fear-of-murdoch-7920816.html)

"I am trying to think of the youngest boy I have ever had because, of course,
you can't tell it here. I think most of the damage comes from the fuss made by
hysterical parents afterwards. If the kids don't mind, fair enough,'' he was
reported to have said in the interview which was conducted at his house.

