May's Notable Quote for Newsletter Writers
Neil Gaiman on the blank page 🖤
Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash
This month’s notable quote is from Neil Gaiman.
Being a writer is a very peculiar sort of job: It’s always you versus a blank sheet of paper (or a blank screen) and quite often the blank piece of paper wins.
Neil Gaiman
In some ways, it’s comforting to know that Neil Gaiman struggles with the blank page just like the rest of us.
My tips for blank screen syndrome associated with newsletter writing, which admittedly do not always work, are to:
1) Keep an ongoing list of ideas for your newsletter so that you can pick something that inspires you when you site down to write,
2) Create a template for your newsletter so that you’re not starting from a blank page, and
3) If you’re feeling stuck, look through newsletters you’ve received in the last week, find one that inspired you in some way, and write about something related to that.
Happy writing this week.
This month has an extra Tuesday in it, so I was thinking maybe I could answer one or two newsletter-related questions for next week’s issue. If you have a newsletter question for me, please comment on this or reply, and I’ll answer in next week’s issue.
As a final note, one of my very favorite things Neil Gaiman has written is the poem/children’s book Blueberry Girl, which he wrote as a blessing for Tori Amos’ daughter 💙
Camille