Dear Geist,

When did people stop writing books and start “crafting” them? Should I be crafting my novel rather than writing it? How does a writer go about crafting?

—Just a Writer, Montreal

Dear Just,

The word craft has been in use in English since the 12th century, and like many words, this one has been quite nimble. Craft can be a noun referring to the skill of an artisan, or a verb referring to a hand-made object (as opposed to a manufactured item), or to a sculpture or building or, indeed, to a poem, essay, story or any written piece. The allure of hand-made—or apparently hand-made—things is always with us, usually in protest against cheap factory goods. A well-known example is the Arts and Crafts Movements that arose in Europe and North America from the 1880s to about 1920, and in the 1920s in Japan. Popular “artisan” foods, drinks, fabrics, jewellery and other goods are more recent examples of the preference for simpler, healthier (if sometimes more expensive) goods. The common denominator in these items is the hand; most of us rarely write longhand any more, but the yearning for hand-made things is part of us.

In the writing life, craft does show. TV and radio hosts compliment a book or a writer’s skill by admiring the writer’s craft (noun) or speaking of the process of writing the book as crafting. The implication is that this writer took more trouble with each and every word, carving it out of a freshly killed tree, whereas some other writer simply sat down and wrote the book at their computer. But no. The real work of writing is the rest: Craft includes the imaginative work of character, plot, pacing, dialogue, emotional structure and all the rest.

So carry on with your plan. Write the book as you would write any of your work—bit by bit by bit. And later on, if someone speaks admiringly of the crafting, just smile and say thank you.

—The Editors