Gerard's Research for Writers

The Drama of Design

   Drama enters your writing project in at least three ways:

1.    The drama of the story itself.
2.    The drama of doing the piece or book-- the actual escalating thrill of researching.
3.    The drama of the process of writing it-- sometimes smooth, often tempestuous, by turns exhilarating and intimidating, full of emotional highs and lows, and climaxing with the finished draft.

   And all of the above begin with attention to design-- not just of the story, but of the experience of finding and writing the story. That is, as you find yourself entranced with the research, tracking down leads for interesting facts and artifacts, as you approach closer and closer to the truth, then put your discoveries into words as prose or poetry, you are yourself the main character in a story of discovery, creation, and epiphany.

   You want that experiential, real-life, real-time "story" to accumulate power in a coherent way, to achieve a satisfying arc, to result in a beautiful, original, and true creation. While it is impossible to guarantee success, you sensibly want to spend your resources of time, energy, emotion, and money in a way that offers the best chance at such success. Likewise, while any project can fall apart for all sorts of reasons, you don't want yours to dissolve into a muddle of unfulfilled expectations, undiscovered sources, and incoherent pages. You want an ending that fulfills the promise of the project and rewards your work.

   So: PLAN. Design the experience. Think of the process of researching and writing as a three-act drama:

• ACT I:: Plan research, including a timetable and budget. Curtain: The finished plan.
• ACT II: Conduct your research according to plan, but also open to new opportunities. Curtain: Research completed, yielding a wealth of discoveries and a strong sense of the truth.
• ACT III (creative nonfiction and some novels): Outline piece and craft proposal. Curtain: The proposal succeeds in capturing both the story you want to tell and an editor's interest.
• Alternative ACT III, #1 (fiction): Outline story or novel. Curtain: The story comes alive in your outline.
• Alternative ACT II #2 (poetry): Craft the concept of a cycle of poems, a book-length ms., or a long poem. Curtain: The project has assumed shape, and you have a notebook full of remarkable images, provocative ideas, and an overall sense of context.

    Naturally the above is just an arbitrary convenience, a way of talking about the process. But you see the point: The experience itself takes on a dramatic shape, as you (the main character) pursue your goal against all obstacles, with interesting and significant consequences. In the end, you get what you want, or you don't, or you get part of it, or you discover something you weren't even looking for and have actually transcended your original plan.

Organizing: The Prologue

      Before you get started on your research, get organized. In your "headquarters," create a system for gathering, sorting, and storing your research so that you can find whatever part of it you need when the time comes. It helps to create the following:

•     A set of hard files. Lots of small files are more useful than one or two gigantic folders. I routinely create a new file for every person I interview, for example, along with a separate file for each discrete place, event, concept, or thing relevant to my research. I keep an alphabetical people file, a place file, etc. Cross-file multiple copies. If you don't know where to put something, keep it in the all-purpose "miscellaneous" file.
•     Hard copy transcripts of all my interviews and field notes-- usually typed and supplemented at the end of each working day before my handwriting turns illegible-- filed in the appropriate folders. 
•     Electronic copies of transcripts and any typed notes kept in several places-- on your hard drive, on a zip-disk at another location, e-mailed as attachments to a server, etc. You don't want to lose precious material because somebody boosts your notebook computer or your hard-drive crashes.
•     A "contacts" file-- again, kept in several locations and updated as you accumulate more contacts: hard copy, Palm Pilot or PDA entries, a disk.
•     A log sheet for interviews. This will contain the name of the subject (interviewee), the date and place of interview, and a notation of whether the interview has been transcribed or exists only in notes. An electronic log is the most versatile, but back it up!
•     Decide whether to create a separate photograph file or keep photos in general folders.
•     If you plan on collecting artifacts-- artwork, clothing, tools, whatever-- create a safe, secure place for them: a cabinet, a footlocker, a sturdy box with a lid. Log and create a file for every artifact. In that file, identify it, note to whom it belongs with contact information, and make a note to remind yourself why you collected it. 

  The Plan

     Now that you have an organized working space and a system for keeping track of everything you discover, start drafting a plan. Two contradictory truths:

1. The order in which you seek out sources will determine the order in which you make discoveries, which will actually shape both the experience and the finished writing. There is probably some ideal Platonic order of discovery for any given project.
2.  The constraints of time and budget, as well as the inherent messiness of the process, will probably mean you never can actually follow that order. This is a good thing-- it takes tremendous pressure off you to create a perfect plan. All you have to do is create a sensible plan.

    Remember: Research is a dynamic process, one discovery leading to another, and it takes place in the real world, where things don't always go as planned, money gets tight at the end of the month, promising leads can disappoint, and unexpected sources show up when you least expect.

    But for most projects, you are probably well-advised to do some basic, grounding research. Often you can pursue this while organizing and brainstorming about your project. If you are writing about a person or event, check the library for a standard reference work on the subject-- a reference librarian or a specialist can help guide you. (Remember: You are part of a university, another name for a collection of experts in many fields.)

    The Internet can be helpful here: For instance, many special collections have an online catalogue, so you can find out where a given set of papers is housed, what material is available, etc. , before you make an expensive trip. On my last project, I was able to get specific documents from the Eisenhower Presidential Library in Abilene, Kansas, via web e-mail to the archivist, saving an expensive and time-consuming trip. You are trying to figure out what you need to know and where it is. This process will continue, so that whatever plan you conceive will have to be amended from time to time. Check WorldCat for published books and monographs-- it will tell you where they are located and if they are available for Interlibrary Loan. Check Amazon.com to see what's out there (also useful at the proposal stage for convincing an editor that there is no book out there quite like yours). If your project requires, arrange to be briefed by an expert who can give you a background in the subject-- a historian, a biologist, an engineer, etc.

    N.B.: If you don't know where to begin, begin somewhere. Make that first call. Read that first article. Visit that first site. Whatever you do, it will likely lead to some interesting next step. You can't do research purely in your head.

    As you establish a foundation for further research, start listing the other sources you are finding (see "Seven Kinds of Archives"). Don't worry about priority yet-- just make a list: people to interview, books to read, sites to visit, collections to access, experiences in which to participate, etc. Once you have amassed a good many sources, create a realistic timeline-- taking into account practical matters. Thus, if three of the folks you need to interview live in the Washington, D.C., area, and you also need to visit the National Archives, plan one trip that includes them all, or as many as possible.

    In your timeline, build in time for the following:

•     Advance arrangement of interviews and site visits.
•     Travel time.
•     Buffers between interviews-- to collect your wits, consult your notes, eat, etc.
•     Transcription sessions-- these always take longer than you think and in some ways are the most tedious and trying part of research; you can, of course, save up all your tapes or disks and transcribe them all after the research is completed, but I've found if you can do the transcriptions in an ongoing way, the task is not so onerous, and you retain a sharper sense of past interviews to help you conduct better the interviews that remain.
•     Waiting times at archives. Some archives, such as the National Archives, do several scheduled "pulls" per day: You request material, submit your written form, and wait for several hours before it comes out. You can use the time to rest, eat a meal, go over notes, or access some other part of the archive without such a waiting period. At the National Archives, for example, often the photo and moving picture/video sections are not as overwhelmed and you may find fast access to key material. Or if you have already identified and requested key material, you can copy it on video, Xerox, or Kodak print versions. If it is possible to request the material in advance, this can compress waiting time.
•     Photocopying documents or photos.
•     Phone contacts and interviews.
•     Internet and e-mail work.
•     Reviewing what you have already obtained and getting at least a preliminary sense of how it connects, including time to make notes on your notes.
•     Rest periods-- both during and between trips.

     Now that you have a timeline, begin gathering the materials and tools you will need. If you are pursuing a project that is very visual, you may want to arrange to borrow or buy a camera, digital camera, and a scanner. Probably a micro-cassette recorder or a mini-disk will be of use for interviews. With the latter I recommend an inexpensive lapel mic of the type available at Radio Shack and other electronics stores for better sound quality. You'll need notebooks, a carryall or briefcase for all the paperwork you'll collect, perhaps a magnifying glass. Certainly pens, disks, batteries, and so on. (See "The Tools of Research" in "Short Research Projects.")

The Budget

      Writers hate to think about money, but practically speaking, it's just another resource that allows us to do our work. If you are selling a book proposal, you want to realistically know how much the project will cost you to do so you know what kind of advance will make it possible. Even if you are pursuing the research purely on your own hook, it's useful to have an idea of what it will cost (independently wealthy writers ignore). You figure this out for several good reasons:

1.     You want to give yourself the best possible chance at finishing the project-- not having to abandon it mid-stream because you just can't afford to pursue it any longer. This is hard enough for a labor of love; there are legal complications if you have taken an advance for a book you can't afford to finish-- i.e., the publisher has a right to get that money back and can sue you for it.
2.     If your calculations show that your plan is too expensive, you now have time to create an alternative plan that perhaps exploits some economies-- e.g., doing an interview via telephone instead of flying to Iceland for a face-to-face; borrowing rather than buying certain tools and materials; lengthening your timeline so you don't have to take unpaid leave from your job.
3.     Not wrecking your life. No, I'm serious-- the whole point of pursuing a research project is to create something beautiful, worthwhile, true to the world, and artistic at the finish. But you don't want to destroy your marriage, the life you've made for yourself, or your health over it. Knowing the costs ahead of time helps you manage the emotional, financial, and physical risks.
4.    N.B.: Issues that seem merely financial often have wider implications. If, for instance, you are interviewing scientists at a conference but can't afford to stay at the conference hotel, you may miss spontaneous conversations and interactions that go to the heart of what you are trying to write. Traveling in sketchy places, if you can't afford to pay a "fixer" and arrange proper transportation, etc., you may expose yourself to unnecessary physical danger.

Items to include in your budget (not a comprehensive list, but common costs):

•     Transportation-- airfare, gas, bus and train tickets, taxi and shuttle fares, boats, rental cars, bikes, whatever.
•     Associated travel costs-- tolls, repairs, parking, special permits, insurance for rental car, etc.
•     Food-- both at restaurants and what you carry with you.
•     Lodging, including taxes.
•     Gratuities.
•     Any costs you plan to absorb on behalf of interview subjects, e.g., dinner and drinks, cab fare, duplicates of certain records.
•     Admission fees to museums, galleries, etc.
•     Registration fees for conferences, etc.
•     Copying charges.
•     Mailing costs.
•     Telephone charges.
•     Photo processing.
•     Film.
•     Notebooks.
•     Disks for computer and/or mini-disk recorder.
•     Batteries.
•     Tools-- camera, videocamera, binoculars, etc.
•     Books, maps, and other research materials.
•     Inoculations for overseas travel.
•     Visa and passport costs.
•     "Exit" and other fees.
•     Hiring a "fixer" and/or interpreter.
•     Lost wages.

    With a little common sense, you can estimate most costs fairly accurately. Hotel and travel rates are usually available on the Internet, either through a dedicated site (USAirways.com) or a broker (Travelocity.com). Or you can find phone numbers on the Internet White or Yellow pages and call for rates and reservations. Likewise for fees at archives, museums, and galleries.

    Like your overall plan, your budget will change-- a frequent flyer coupon may give you a free airfare you hadn't counted on, or an archive may have more documents to photocopy than you planned on. So include a fudge factor of plus or minus 20%. And just as you log all interviews and file all documents faithfully, keep careful records of expenditures: save receipts, write on them what they were for, and keep a log for the project. This will not only keep you honest about what you are really spending but also come in handy at tax time. See your accountant before you embark on a major project to take full advantage of deductions.

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