There’s No Rule

Jan 13

There’s no rule on how it is to build products. Ernest Hemingway said this. Well, not really:

“There’s no rule on how it is to write. Sometimes it comes easily and perfectly. Sometimes it is like drilling rock and then blasting it out with charges.”
Ernest Hemingway to Charles Poore, 1953, Selected Letters, pp. 800–801
From Ernest Hemingway on Writing by Larry W. Phillips

I think this quote applies to building technology products too. And marketing. And sales. And being a father. And…

What about knowledge, process, and skill? Yes, these are to product creation as grammar, rules, and technique are to writing. Unique results come from rule-breaking and hard work.

And the rock-blasting is never done:

“…writing is something that you can never do as well as it can be done. It is a perpetual challenge and it is more difficult than anything else that I have ever done—so I do it. And it makes me happy when I do it well.”
Hemingway to Ivan Kashkin, 1935. Selected Letters. Ibid. p. 419.

Creating something new is a perpetual challenge. Sometimes it comes easily. Sometimes it’s like blasting rock. Maybe Earnest Hemmingway would have been a good computer scientist.