History by Nikki

This is surely one of the most difficult pieces I’ve had to write. What one topic do I want to dedicate the next four to eight years of evenings, weekends and numerous holidays to researching? I must filter the many half-formed ideas in my head down and created one crafted, succinct proposal for a history PhD, and it’s proving to be incredibly hard. Firstly, I’m trying to discover a gap, a little niche that will provide me with the material to create something of value. Finding that wellspring is taking up a huge amount of time. I have a problem in that I feel that I’ve said everything that I want to say on my Masters dissertation topic and would like a change from it, so instead of providing me with a starter I understood it as a part that I’d like to bring to a close. I’m attempting to do some iterative narrowing, as I know the broad area of history that I want to work in but need to find my space in it. I’m trying to find an area within a larger area until I get to that space. And I come up with three or four ideas and settle on one that I believe will sustain my interest.

I thought that once I had worked out the the research topic, that would be the most difficult part done. Not so. It’s been three months since I’ve done any academic writing (which isn’t very long) and I’m struggling to write the first sentence. For some reason working on this piece has prompted a crisis of confidence. It takes me many attempts before I get a sentence written down  that I’m relatively happy with. I have the advice in my head that it should be an attention grabber, it should make the reader want to go on. It’s rather hard to create that sentence. And it gets changed multiple times before the first draft is completed. 

Maybe it’s nerves. I need to include a bibliography, and ensuring that there are enough primary sources to sustain an 80,000 word topic has me in a bit of a panic. I think there are, but can I be sure before I even start the project? And I have this fear that someone has already done this work and has written all that needs to be said about this topic, and that worry won’t go away. Even though I’ve looked and looked, and haven’t found the work that I keep thinking is out there.

Anyway, I do write a first draft. Between the pondering over a topic and the fiddling with individual words to ensure that I write exactly what I mean, it takes six weeks. And even then, I’m only mostly comfortable. I could have just got the words down on screen quickly and then started the painful process of pottering with sentences. But I’ve never been successful at writing in that way, although I wish I could be. Something to work on.

My former Masters dissertation supervisor has very kindly offered to read it for me and provide feedback, so I’m now eagerly awaiting the email. And then on to the second draft…