Intellectual work requires collecting snippets. Noting, on the fly, an interesting fact, a funny pun, or a marvelous idea, often while reading. Saving for later ornaments to amuse and bewilder, pure wit to illustrate or motivate.
Intellectual work requires writing too. But writing around snippets proves itself to be very impractical. A text revolves around a main point, a proposition which, most of the time, needs to be elaborated by more than snippets.
Writing a proposition requires unity and progression. Unity comes from focus : taking one proposition and showing most of what it says, most of what it does not, most of what it entails. Progression comes from understanding : following through all that is said so it flows naturally and sensibly.
Intellectual work, then, requires both courage and prudence. It takes courage, since the writer alone is responsible for the unity and progression of his proposition. It takes prudence too, since the reader never fails to forget.
While writing, pasting a little snippet from time to time can be useful. Sometimes it may even be mandatory. All the same, writing always recreates the silence of an exam room : one's on his own.
