Well, it’s finally here. The first of November. The day we’ve all been waiting for – the first day of Polyglot NaNoWriMo. First of all, I just want to say how absolutely blown away I’ve been by the amount of support and enthusiasm I’ve seen on both Twitter and Instagram about this challenge – for the past few years there have maybe been a handful of people involved, and this time… well, I think it’s safe to say there’ll be quite a few more. Thank you all for your likes and shares, trying to bring this event to as many people as possible – it’s been genuinely so lovely to see.
Now let’s get down to brass tacks. As you may know if you’ve followed my progress on this blog for the past few years, you’ll know that I’ve participated exclusively in Swedish, even though I did flirt briefly with the idea of doing it in Faroese one year, but chickened out at the last minute. Well, as a result of some gentle encouragement from a friend who shall remain nameless but Italian, this year I’m stepping all the way outside of my comfort zone and I’ll be writing in German. Don’t worry though, the story will still most likely be about witchcraft, because let’s face it… it just wouldn’t be me otherwise, would it? My grasp of German is tenuous at best, so I suppose we’ll see how this works out – but I’m keeping myself pretty motivated, I’ve had some pretty good ideas for this project so I’m looking forward to getting them down on paper and fleshing them out.
I did have another idea related to this project, that I wanted to discuss with you guys. I’ve never done this before, but there’s always a feeling of ‘what next’ when it comes to these projects. So I was thinking… for my blog post in February, after we’ve all had some time to proofread and edit, if a couple of people were willing to share their work and send me a short extract (maybe 200-300 words), I could post something of a Polyglot NaNoWriMo Anthology, with some examples of what people have come up with? That might be a good way of inspiring people for next year, or just a good way to get your work out there. What do you think? Would this be something that might interest you? Feel free to reach out on Twitter and Instagram, or even leave a comment here if you’re willing to make a public pledge! I’ve always wanted to post my finished story on this blog, but to be perfectly honest, I haven’t managed to finish one in all of the years I’ve been trying. So I think this might give me an extra little push to make sure I hit that 6,000 word goal!
Well I’ve gone on quite long enough, we’ve all got other things to be reading and writing! Good luck everyone with your respective challenges, don’t forget to use the hashtag #PolyglotNaNoWriMo on Twitter and Instagram to share your progress as you go along – that way we can all try and keep each other motivated to finish! As always, you can get in touch with me on Twitter and Instagram (I’m @sprakskatan on both) or by leaving a comment here. Thanks as always for reading, and good luck!
– J.
den språkliga skatan 