When legendary Beat Generation author Jack Kerouac died in 1969, the first personal computers were still at least 10 years away. He lived in a world without AI, where you crafted your writing yourself, sentence by sentence. Now, with the advent of ChatGPT, “The Button” in Google Docs, and similar features in MS Word, we are fast-forwarding into a future when we’ll never again have to think about how to start an article, blog post, grant proposal, or email—we can just offload it to an AI and refine the results. Sounds great, right?
Losing your voice?
But there’s a catch: besides hallucinating, AI text generators produce hopelessly generic writing. What’s more “people anchor on the first idea they see,” so writers who use AI for their first draft may never succeed in injecting their unique voice into it, even if they rewrite the piece completely. How can writers, academic or otherwise, gain the benefits of AI tools while still writing fresh and engaging articles and papers? The surprising answer is a technique pioneered by Beat Generation writers like Jack Kerouac—freewriting.
Unleashing the techniques of the Beat Generation
Encompassing individuals like Jack Kerouac, William Burroughs, and Allen Ginsberg, the Beat Generation describes a group of young American authors who made waves in the 1950s with visionary books and poems like On the Road, Naked Lunch, and Howl. Beat Generation authors sought to bring their uncensored consciousness to the page, and they had a method for doing so, which Jack Kerouac called spontaneous prose and we call freewriting. Freewriting means that you sit down for a defined period of time and write whatever comes to your head, without pausing to look back or to reflect on the right word or thought to use. You connect with your true concerns, get them on paper or on a screen, and only refine and edit them later on. Kerouac used this technique to write On the Road in a non-stop, three-week writing frenzy in which he used taped-together rolls of paper to avoid interrupting the flow, and it is a technique that you can fruitfully combine with generative AI.
The Marriage of Freewriting and AI
So, how can freewriting amplify the potential of generative AI? First, you can use freewriting to generate your unique input, rather than solely relying on AI to generate content. Set a timer for 30 minutes and allow your thoughts to pour onto the page regarding your chosen topic. Then, afterwards, use AI to refine and improve the text, eliminating redundancies and enhancing the overall quality. Second, you can leverage the kind of freewriting prompts suggested by writing guru Peter Elbow to help you evaluate AI writing suggestions and separate the wheat from the chaff. In no time at all, you’ll have excellent articles and posts that sound distinctively like you.
Unlock the Power of Freewriting: Join the Academic Writing Workshop
Would you like to delve deeper into freewriting techniques and learn how to combine them with AI to refine your writing skills and generate extraordinary content? We’ll be offering engaging in-person seminars in inspiring venues in Berlin from September onwards. Spend two days with us, and you’ll gain insights into how freewriting, combined with AI, can transform your academic writing, allowing your creativity to thrive. Just sign-up for the latest information by submitting your email address at the end of this page and you’ll be first in line for great deals on our seminars when we launch. We can’t wait to help you unlock a new level of writing prowess.