Nanowrimo — What Is It and Why to Take Part
The NaNoWriMo project can be very interesting, in this article I’ll explain what it is.
This article is the English version; if you are interested in the Italian version, you can find it here: NaNoWriMo — Cos’è e Perché Parteciparvi
Introduction — Why I wrote this article
I have known this project for several years, but I have never taken part in it. This year, however, I took courage, and I want to try it. I want to test myself and share the experience and knowledge, hoping this information can help others and maybe even encourage them to participate.
What is and how NaNoWriMo was born
NaNoWriMo (an acronym for National Novel Writing Month) is a non-profit organization (I’ll return to this at the end of the article), founded in 1999 in the United States, by freelance writer Chris Baty, with the sole purpose of motivating aspiring writers in writing their first novel.
The NaNoWriMo project is very well known globally, even if it does not have the right awards in Italy. Just think, when it came to life, the participants were only 21, and they were part of the San Francisco Bay Area. The following year, the site registered 140 users of different nationalities. Today, the members are hundreds of thousands, belonging to 633 countries worldwide, including Italy, and recording over 50,000 winners. However, NaNoWriMo is not a prize competition. Apart from an identification badge and the satisfaction of having completed a short novel of at least 50,000 words in just 30 days, you win nothing.
Unleash your creativity by writing a first draft of a story. You won’t have to compete with anyone but yourself and with time. You will not have to worry too much about the form, the revisions, the conclusions, but only to produce at least the minimum of characters required (on average 1667 words per day if you write every day). Don’t forget to respect the deadlines: you will have to send your manuscript by 11:59 pm on November 30th to participate in the project officially. If not, it will waste your labors.
How does NaNoWriMo work?
The creative writing project carried out by NaNoWriMo is somewhat unusual but very useful. The goal is to push an aspiring author to write.
Have you ever sat down at the computer heated by the noblest intentions, and in an attempt to jot down a few paragraphs, have you been forced to stop to make room for daily chores?
Family, university, work, and maybe even a little social life are priority commitments. To make space for all this, you are often forced to sacrifice the time reserved for writing. How many times have you seen the dream fade and the hope of seeing your work published? NaNoWriMo forces you to take the time to draft. Somehow, your path will become more linear, with well-timed rhythms for reaching the goal.
November is the right month to dedicate yourself to your passion for writing, as there is the most famous event of NaNoWriMo (there are other events, however, at different times of the year). You will have 30 days to organize your work. All you have to do is sign up on the official website and accept this unusual challenge, which, annually, attracts thousands of users from all over the world. The November event is the most important of NaNoWriMo.
The project has no limits on membership. So even if you are a housewife, a freelancer, an employee, or a simple reading enthusiast with the desire to get involved, you can still take part.
Any particular guidelines or issues do not bound you. You can imprint your novel on any genre as long as it is within your reach: fantasy, fanfiction, horror, or proceed along a romantic line to break the hearts of the most sentimental. NaNoWriMo offers you a wide opportunity that not all sites can provide you. So grab it on the fly!
50,000 words, how many there are
It isn’t easy to realize how much 50,000 words can be, so I report below some famous books of various genres with relative words:
- The Old man and the Sea (by Ernest Hemingway), little over than 25,000 words;
- I am Legend (by Richard Matheson), little over than 25,000 words;
- Animal Farm by (George Orwell), a little less than 30,000 words;
- Fahrenheit 451 (by Ray Bradbury), a little less than 47,000 words;
- The Great Gatsby (by F. Scott Fitzgerald), little over than 47,000 words;
- The Late Mattia Pascal (by Luigi Pirandello), little over than 60,000 words;
- The Lord of the Flies (by William Golding), little over than 60,000 words;
- Harry Potter and the Philosopher’s Stone (by J. K. Rowling), little over than 75,000 words;
- The Hobbit (by J. R. R. Tolkien), a little less than 100,000 words;
- Moby Dick (by Herman Melville) a little less than 210,000 words.
Rules for participating in the annual project
To entice you to write and unleash your creativity, NaNoWriMo leaves you free to better organize your work, but of course, there are some simple rules to respect:
1) The challenge starts at midnight on November 1st and ends at 23:59 on November 30th (regarding local time). In any case, you can continuously monitor the time available to you from the site itself.
2) There is no possibility that someone will start before you or finish later. The competition has equal timing for everyone, valid anywhere in the world. It is impossible to ask for extensions. You will have to send your content (remember at least 50,000 words to be accepted) by the established date and time.
3) Starting November 20th, you will be able to copy and paste your story in the area of the site. The count of the 50,000 words will take place automatically (depending on the program used to write, there may be minor differences in the number of characters, so for safety, it is better to write a few more words).
4) It doesn’t matter if the novel is complete or not. You can also submit a simple draft to be completed at a later time. The lack of a conclusion or correct formatting does not affect your work and does not stop you from winning.
5) You can choose any genre, with no limit. You can insert a story already in progress or a new one tailored for the event. Furthermore, you can decide to write both in Italian and in a foreign language (such as in English, as long as you know how to write them discreetly and that you are not an impediment to achieving the goal).
6) Registration on the site is free. It requires the data to be entered only for the validation of the manuscript. Recall that the word count takes place through the NaNoWriMo system. For the drafting, you can rely on any editor, remembering to update your progress daily.
7) The other participants in the competition will not see your story’s content, so all possibilities of plagiarism are excluded. They will view only your nickname, the title of the novel, and the progress made each day based on the level of privacy you have set (for whom my project is visible: only me, friends, or public).
8) Planning and use of notes is permitted but may use no material written before November 1st directly in your manuscript.
The ultimate goal is not the competition between users, but the comparison with themselves. The challenge is proposed precisely to help you get involved, meet deadlines, and set goals, so you can give space to your passion without setting it aside as you did in the past.
You will, therefore, have a full month to write 50,000 words. We’re talking about 1667 words a day, about 3 or 4 pages a day. Writing this number of words is not an impossible task, especially if you have an easy pen (or keyboard key, depending on how you want to write) and a runaway fantasy.
What you win
As we said in the previous paragraphs, the project does not include any prize. Whoever wins does not receive any special money or awards. However, as soon as you upload your 50,000 words story to the official website, you will automatically get a printable badge as proof of your participation.
For some years, NaNoWriMo has been collaborating with sponsors who reward the competition winners with discounts on services, software, a certain number of paperback copies of the manuscript, or with deals that allow selling the book digitally on Amazon, all writing-related awards. An interesting input to get started, isn’t it?
Why join NaNoWriMo
Joining the project gives you an excellent opportunity to embark on a new adventure. After all, the initiative aims to give aspiring writers a chance in the articulated world of writing. If you have developed creativity and a certain fluidity, it will not be challenging to achieve.
Otherwise, managing your time without neglecting daily commitments and jotting down 50,000 words in just 30 days is already a victory, regardless of the competition’s outcome.
Did you know that most of the novels sent to NaNoWriMo, properly corrected and formatted, have since become successful books? These are just a few examples:
- “Cinder, Moon Chronicles” by Marissa Meyer.
- “Water to the elephants” by Sara Gruen (from which based the related film).
- “Wool. Trilogy of the Silo” by Hugh Howey.
- “The night circus” by Erin Morgenstern (of which the film is in progress).
- “Fangirl” by Rainbow Rowell.
Maybe the next book to be published could be yours, and it could be born (or grow) right in November!
Support NaNoWriMo
As mentioned in the article, the NaNoWriMo project is non-profit; therefore, it is supported only through voluntary donations (I remind you that no payment is necessary to take part) and gadgets.
So if you think this project could be useful, why not donate something to return a part of what you will receive in terms of experience? Eventually, if you aren’t sure, you can always take part and decide later.
Conclusion
I will take part this year, and you? If I have convinced you, subscribe to the following address https://nanowrimo.org/.
If you are curious, at the following link, you can follow my progress (once you have registered): https://nanowrimo.org/participants/filippor.
Also, you can read the next article here:
Thanks for reading; if you liked it (or even if you didn’t like it) or if you have any considerations about it, let me know in the comments.
