What if the answer to a stuck or stalling writing project wasn't to sit back down at your desk - but to pick up a pair of scissors? In this episode of This Might Work, host Bec Evans explores the cut-and-reassemble method developed by Mason Currey, bestselling author of Daily Rituals, who turns redrafting into what he calls a funky art project. Then she puts it to the test with Harriet Mason, a professional copywriter tackling her first novel, who prints out her entire manuscript, clears the kitchen table, and starts cutting. Can getting physical with your words unlock what staring at a screen couldn't?

About the guests

Mason Currey: Mason Currey is the author of the Daily Rituals books - Daily Rituals: How Artists Work (2013) and Daily Rituals: Women at Work (2019) - featuring brief profiles of the day-to-day working lives of more than 300 great creative minds. His brilliant new book Making Art and Making a Living examines the collision of creative ambitions with real-world necessities and the compromises that gifted individuals have patched together when facing the eternal dilemma of funding an artistic life. Currey lives in Los Angeles and writes Subtle Maneuvers, a twice-monthly newsletter on the creative process. Currey lives in Los Angeles and writes Subtle Maneuvers, a twice-monthly newsletter on the creative process.

Harriet Mason: Harriet Mason is a professional writer, storyteller and communication specialist based in Ilkley, West Yorkshire. She started writing her own stories in 2020 and was shortlisted for the Fish Short Memoir Prize in 2023, published in The London Writer’s Salon anthology 2024 and she is currently writing a novel set in the 1920s. You can find Harriet on Instagram: harriet_moorcommunication or Substack: In Other Words.

For bonus material and conversations about the experiments featured in the show, visit Breakthroughs & Blocks on Substack.

If you enjoy the show, please leave a five-star review. It’s one of the biggest ways you can help new listeners discover the podcast.

This Might Work is written and presented by Bec Evans and Chris Smith, authors of Written: How to Keep Writing and Build a Habit That Lasts.

Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.