EVER WONDER HOW YOUR WRITING COMPARES to famous authors? Whether you are a working author, or someone who would like to be, who wouldn’t want to know how they measured up to Stephen King, Maya Angelou, Barbara Kingsolver, Arthur Conan Doyle, Norman Mailer, or W. Somerset Maughan?

While you may not be able to compare quality of content, you can compare quantity, at least as measured in daily word counts. When I began writing, I’d never heard of a daily word count goal, but believe me, without one, you’re probably never going to finish that novel that’s been sitting on your desktop for the last couple of months…or years.

And if setting a word count goal sounds sterile and unartistic, not something a true writer would need to or want to do, keep reading. You’ll be surprised.

I found this little gem online. Amanda Peterson of Writers Write gives us a glimpse into the daily word counts of almost forty authors, old and new. I’ll never fall into Michael Crichton’s 10,000 words a day territory, but was happy to be keeping company with Jack London, Stephen King, and Barbara Kingsolver.

The Daily Word Counts of 39 Famous Authors by Amanda Peterson of Writers Write