How you can write a book - without actually writing a thing...

Did you know that one of the very successful authors whose books you can find in bookstores today – never actually wrote a book?

He didn’t actually write a thing!

I know it sounds impossible... Here’s what he did.

By the way, you may have heard of this technique before. However, this is LIVING PROOF that it really works!

The author I am talking about is a guy named Richard Feynman. He won the Nobel Prize in Physics back in 1965 for helping to formulate the theory of “quantum electrodynamics” – the theory of how electrons and photons interact with each other in the micro-world.

If you go to any bookstore and look in their “science” or “physics” section, you are guaranteed to find a book there (and probably many more) by Richard Feynman. In fact, some of his books are STILL some of the best-selling books in physics today. That’s incredible, given that he passed away about 16 years ago, in 1987.

How did he ”write” his books?

He had them “recorded”...

For example, one of his most popular books is a book of stories of various “adventures” he’s had in his life.

Stories like how he figured out how to crack the safes at Los Alamos National Laboratory when he was working there during WWII.

Or how, as a kid, those around him were amazed that he could fix radios – he had to “think” how to do it – so they said he “fixed radios by thinking”!

Another story was how he went to Japan for a physics conference, and decided to not stay at the Western-style hotel he was put in, but moved into a Japanese-style hotel so he could experience authentic Japanese culture. And his experiences with that!

As I said, he didn’t push a single typewriter or computer key to write these stories down, and he didn’t pick up a pen.

What happened was that Richard Feynman would often tell these stories to his friend Ralph Leighton when they had enjoyable bongo-drumming sessions. One day, Ralph Leighton decided to bring a tape recorder, and leave it running while Richard Feynman was telling his stories!

The transcripts of these spoken word recorded sessions were then edited down, to create a couple of the books that Richard Feynman has “written”.

Not only that however. He’s also credited as the author of several technical physics books. Didn’t he write those?

Well, no. In fact, those are transcriptions of lectures he gave as part of his job as a Professor of Physics at CalTech. His lectures were often recorded, and those recordings were again transcribed to make these physics books. Where he wrote down equations on the blackboard, those equations were inserted into the text.

Again, he didn’t really “write” these books – not in the sense we think of. He SPOKE them.

The fact is, if you can speak, you can write. The Nobel Prizewinning physicist Richard Feynman proves it!

By the way, if you are really interested in this process, you can actually get both the recorded versions of some of his works, then the later transcribed versions too. You can see where the edits were made, if you’re really interested.

For example, I recently bought some CDs of those original recordings that Richard Feynman made, of those stories he told while he was talking to Ralph Leigthon after their bongo-drumming sessions. You can get those here:

http://www.scs-intl.com/trader/feynman_audio.shtm

And of course, you can get the books which came from those sessions at Amazon.com or at any other decent bookstore. The most popular of these is called, “Surely You’re Joking Mr. Feynman!”

So if you can’t “write” – but you can “speak” – don’t let that stop you! Just get yourself a tape recorder, a tape, and turn it on!

(Or go with the fancy digital recording devices they have nowadays if you want to go high-tech!)

- Dien Rice

P.S. If the thought of all that transcribing gets you down, you can PAY someone to transcribe it. It may not be all that cheap - but it is the easiest way to "write" a book. Once you have your transcription, then it's all about editing...


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