Some people write fast — Joyce Carol Oates, for example, has written 34 novels since 1964. In her own name, that is — she’s also published 11 pseudonymous novels, dozens of short story collections, a couple of YA and kids books, plus a zillion articles and reviews. Thomas Pynchon is not a fast writer: he got started a year earlier and has written just seven books. Seems like quality and speed aren’t really connected.
Case in point, as music producer Rick Rubin tells Esquire:
I was talking to Leonard Cohen, and he was saying it takes him typically three years to write a song. And he said that once he was having a conversation with Bob Dylan, comparing songs of each other’s that they liked. And Bob said, “Well, how long did it take to write ‘Hallelujah’?” And Leonard said, “Three years.” And then he asked Bob, “How long did it take you to write ‘I and I’?” And Bob said, “Fifteen minutes.”
I can’t even write a blog post in 15 minutes.