On writing drunk

The subject of writing drunk--namely, whether it's a good idea for a writer--is one that pops up now and again on writing sites. Some really believe it helps with the creative process by freeing the mind of inhibitions and getting the brain to open up to new possibilities. Some think the benefits are imagined, and that in any event, drinking past a certain point will make your writing so incoherent, any benefits you've gained from freeing your mind will be offset by the nonsense of your prose when looked at in the cold light of the next day.

One common means of trying to marry the mental liberation of alcohol with the benefits of clear-mindedness is the old aphorism, often credited to Hemingway, of "write drunk, edit sober." That is, use alcohol as an aid to opening up creativity while slapping down that first draft, but then look at it later with a more critical eye, smoothing out the roughness left by your free-thinking drunkard. (At least one writing advice blogger tried this for a week.)

Just from a basic smell test perspective, this idea does make some sense. A lot of writers advise not censoring yourself too much during the first draft. Burroway's textbook on writing emphasizes the importance of "shitty first drafts," without which the stunning eleventh draft would never be possible. Just get it out there on the page. You can fix shit, but you can't fix nothing.

My writing relationship with alcohol

I do drink while writing sometimes. I don't drink much--maybe once a week--so it's easy for me to get a rapid buzz going. I don't so much drink because I feel it helps me write as I drink because I tend to write a lot on the weekends, and that's when I also like to drink. I don't want to write and then drink, because by the time I'm done writing, it's a little late to get my drink on, so I tend to just multi-task and do both at once.

I can't say whether alcohol helps with creativity. It's a little hard to tell, because I can't isolate alcohol enough to make it a controlled variable. There are some nights where Mrs. Heretic and the kids are happily doing their own thing, I have several hours of uninterrupted writing, and I get a lot done. If I happened to have been drinking during that time, I might credit it to the alcohol when in fact, it was more just the peace and quiet. Since I write around work and fatherhood, I sometimes get up in the wee hours of the morning to write before anyone else is up, and that can oftentimes be as productive as drinking and writing in the late hours on the weekend.

I don't think the alcohol makes me a better writer. But, it does probably have one very profound effect on me while I'm writing. The most frequent reason I stop writing before getting done what I'd wanted to is self-doubt. "This is shit, I'm wasting my time, writing is stupid and so am I." That's probably how about one in three writing sessions ends for me. But I'm invariably a happy drunk. It helps me get past my own self-loathing long enough to get something onto the page.

I took a long time getting to where I drank at all. My first drink was at 23. The first time I got drunk, I was 27. After that, I would still sometimes go an entire year without drinking any alcohol. I had a weird sort of philosophy. I believed life was shitty, and that it was the responsibility of a serious thinking person to face the full shittiness of life without pain killers. I think I was under the impression that if I dulled my senses at all, I'd end up thinking life was less awful than it is, and I'd see it in a less truthful way. In the last, say, five years or so, however, I've become far more flexible on the subject. I'm just trying to make it to fifty. If a little booze-backed vacation from my problems every now and again helps me get there, I'm no longer going to deny myself that. I'm like a mother who swore off taking an epidural during labor who finally, after two or three kids, gave in and got one. Now I just wonder why it took me so long.

I certainly think that drinking and writing is worth a try. Don't drink so much you're out of it. Try to find that happy buzzed zone and stay there. There is somewhat mixed evidence that moderate alcohol can make you better at foreign languages; there's no reason to think that wouldn't be true of using your native language creatively.


-Composed whilst drinking Weyerbacher's Blithering Idiot; edited the following morning while drinking tea.