I once read an interview with Hunter S. Thompson, and he was asked if he had switched to computers, and he said no, he didn’t like them—he didn’t like how you could go back and change the text. He said he always wrote something as though it were final. If there were changes to be made, he went back later and crammed a new piece of paper in the thing and rewrote it.
This is my greatest issue with writing. I don’t care about any websites. I read almost none of them. I don’t have accounts on any social networking websites and don’t use any services. So it’s not as though I’m distracted. When I sit down to write, I spend so much time fucking around with the stuff I’ve already written. It feels more comfortable than actually carving away at something new. As a result I have dozens of essays and stories I never end up finishing because they’re been edited to hell and no new thing is added.
For this reason I think I will get a typewriter, maybe one of those huge IBM models from the 1970s. I don’t give a damn about those terrible old vintage models everyone always has in their house and pretends to use. I don’t care that it’s quaint, or from an older time, or whatever. I just want a machine that does one thing, and does not allow me to go back and change anything. I want to sit down at the damn thing and think out every sentence without second-guessing myself.
So there it is, whatever it is!