Climbing Mount Manuscript: How to write 10,000 words in a week

Writing a big manuscript is hard, especially if you’re stretched for time. Planning a mega-binge writing session can help to take that dreaded manuscript from dragging along to happily drafted. How? With an excellent writing plan and serious dedication to the cause, you might just be able to get it done.

Aah, the joys of academic writing, where deadlines loom large and caffeine flows freely. Publish or perish, my dear scholar.

All jokes aside, sometimes we do need to reach otherworldly levels of productivity. When that funding is running out and you still have two manuscripts waiting to be written, it can help to just write a lot really fast. But how do you do that?

First things first: check if you’re ready

Writing a large manuscript fast is much easier when you’ve spent a fair amount of time thinking about the topic. This is because your mind has already developed connections between your work, and the work of others. The ideas will be more readily available, allowing you to express them more easily when you’re writing up.

To gauge whether a binge writing session is the right move for you, a good rule of thumb I learned is: can you write the abstract?

This doesn’t have to be the beautifully worded abstract that makes its way into the final version of the manuscript, but it helps if you can answer these questions in a few sentences:

• Why is this research/review/… important?
• What did you study/review/… exactly?
• How did you do this?
• What did you find?
• What are the scientific implications?
• What are the societal implications?

If you struggle to answer multiple questions, it could help to spend more time thinking about your research. Of course, you could still give binge writing a try, just be warned😉.

Step 1: make a writing plan

If you have decided that you want to try and hit that 10,000 word mark in a week, it’s time to make a writing plan. The writing plan tells you what to write, so you can keep writing during your binge session and don’t have to constantly decide what to write next.

There are different ways to make a writing plan, depending on your preference and on the level of detail you can achieve. Some sections of the plan may be more detailed than others, and that’s okay. The important thing is that the plan allows you to keep writing.

Detailed outlining for the stuff you know well

A detailed outline tells you exactly what you need to write and yields a draft that won’t need much editing. This is a good strategy when you know your topic well. Below is an excerpt of a detailed outline for my PhD thesis on coastal flood protection with mangrove forests:

• Argument 1: Global climate change will lead to increased flood risk, therefore we need to upgrade coastal flood protection structures.
  • Statement: Global climate change will lead to increased flood risk.
  • Statement: We need to upgrade coastal flood protection structures.
• Argument 2: Upgrading coastal flood protection structures is expensive, so we should look for alternative solutions such as nature-based flood defence with mangrove forests.
  • Statement: Upgrading coastal flood protection structures is expensive.
  • Statement: Nature-based flood defence with mangroves offer a valid alternative.
• Argument 3: Mangrove forests are damaged by coastal storms, potentially reducing their flood protection capacity. However, we can’t predict this, so we should study how this works.
  • Statement: Mangrove forests are affected by storms.
  • Statement: Storm damage may reduce the mangrove’s flood protection capacity.
  • Etc…

I like this outline, because all I need to do is provide each statement with explanations and proof that the statement is true. However, it can be hard to reach this level of detail throughout an entire writing plan, especially if you’re newer to a topic (I’ve written this introduction so many times that I could write it in my sleep). In that case, you can mix with simpler outlining strategies for more difficult sections of the writing plan.

Socratic questioning with ChatGPT

Socratic questioning is a strategy that requires less detail. The questioning style is named after Socrates, who used it to spark critical thinking in his students. There are many resources on the internet to come up with your own Socratic questions, including the supercharged AI assistant ChatGPT.

Here, I’ve asked ChatGPT3 to “Please provide me with 3 Socratic questions for a scientific paper about using mangrove forests in coastal flood protection”, and here’s what I got:

1. What advantages do mangrove forests offer for coastal flood protection compared to traditional methods?
2. What scientific evidence supports the effectiveness of mangrove forests in reducing wave energy and erosion, thus serving as a natural defense against flooding?
3. What are the limitations and challenges associated with implementing mangrove-based coastal flood protection strategies, and how can they be addressed

Not bad! Of course, you should always use your own critical thinking skills to decide if ChatGPT’s output makes sense.

Other strategies

The strategies described above are not the only tools for making a writing plan. In fact, there are probably as many strategies as there are writers. For more inspiration you could have a look at this thesis map developed by Thesis Whisper Inger Mewburn, or these outlining strategies presented by social scientist and academic writing teacher Raul Pacheco-Vega.

Step 2: find space, time, and motivation

As you probably know, it’s hard to get into a nice writing flow when you’re constantly interrupted. So block that agenda and don’t allow any meetings, and turn off your email program, phone, and other sources of seemingly urgent messages. Also, find a space where you can write well, be it the library, a local café, or your home office.

Beyond space and time, motivation will help tremendously to keep going. This is not my own insight, but something Rachel Aaron found. She is a science fiction writer and analysed how she could have more productive writing days. She realised that she could write much more when she was excited about the scenes she was working on, and would occasionally even have 10,000 word days.

While intrinsic motivation is harder to come by when you’re writing science instead of fiction, you could try external motivation strategies such as rewarding yourself for every 2,000 words you write (or 500, if your brain needs more frequent motivation). Find something you really like, be it a cappuccino or a 1-hour gaming session. I’m serious! Don’t make this a vague promise to yourself, but plan it as a real part of your writing plan. 2000 words? Fun socks. 4000 words? Fancy wine. Let’s go!

…or book a writing retreat

If you’re in need of more dedicated time, space, and motivation, you could also consider an academic writing retreat. Whether you book a week away to an inspiring destination, organise a retreat with co-workers, or join an organised retreat, one thing is certain: retreats work. They provide the much-needed space and time to focus, and being around fellow scientific writers and sharing your struggles can hugely benefit your own motivation.

I’ve heard of many forms of writing retreats over the years, but one in particular stands out to me: the Thesis Bootcamp. Mainly hosted in Australia, it’s a dedicated weekend with fellow late-stage PhD’s aiming to write 20,000 words in three days. Seemingly impossible, some students manage to reach 25,000 words, and many hit the 10,000 word mark. I’ve never joined one, but it sounds quite fun because you get a little token and a round of applause for every 5,000 words you reach.

Step 3: write ugly and fast

Climbing the 10,000-word mountain in a week (or weekend) means you need to hit that keyboard mileage. That means no stopping. No stopping to edit a sentence to make it more pretty, no stopping to look up a better synonym (looking at myself here), and no stopping to find the correct name for the reference. The result can be quite ugly, but it’s nothing to worry about. It’s much easier to edit after you’re done writing, than constantly interrupt your writing flow to edit the text.

This type of writing without stopping is called generative writing. It’s a form of freewriting, where you write whatever comes to mind without censoring or judging. In freewriting, this can be on-topic or off-topic, but in generative writing you write specifically about the topics laid out in your writing plan. For example, in the detailed outline above I’d first write about how climate change leads to increasing flood risk, and for the Socratic questions I’d write detailed answers that can be edited into more coherent paragraphs later on.

Even more creative: don’t write at all. Academic writer Mushtaq Bilal recorded himself giving a seminar, and then used voice-to-text software to write it out. He managed to ‘write’ 13,000 words in 2 hours.

That’s it!

Even if you don’t hit your word count, dedicating time and energy to such a momentous undertaking can be exhausting. So don’t forget to take a nice long break, gain some mental distance from your work (always useful for editing), and regain writing energy for later.