Collecting as a writing process

Writers collect and record facts, impressions, opinions, and ideas that are relevant to their subject, purpose, and audience. Mark Twain, author of Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, once observed that if you attempt to carry a cat around the block by its tail, you'll gain a whole lot of information about cats that you'll never forget.

You may collect such firsthand information as in the example above, or you may rely on the data, experience, or expertise of others. Collecting involves observing, remembering, imagining, thinking, reading, listening, writing, investigating, talking, taking notes, and experimenting. Collecting also involves thinking about the relationships among the collected bits of information.