When I was younger, I had the perception that authors sat down to write books with no story outline and no plan for what would occur in the book. I thought it was the case that to do any planning beforehand would stifle the creativity of writing, making the story uninteresting and wooden in the plotting (My thought process wasn’t so complex, but that was essentially my thought). And I am not the only one who has ever thought this. I have friends who believe it to be the case that authors should sit down and just write, rather than having a story outline or any idea what they are first going to write.
Now, I think you are crazy if you think that because the thought is insane. For those of who think like this, take a second and think about what you are asking a person to do. You are asking a person to create a well plotted, well-written, entertaining piece of text that is anywhere from 60,000 to 120,000 words in length. This could come out to anywhere from 150 single-spaced pages to 400 single-spaced pages. Now, riddle me this. Would you write a paper that was fifty pages long without even an outline? There is going to be that one guy who raises his hand in the back who says he would do no planning, but for almost everyone else, they are planning in some way. Now, imagine if that paper was four times the size. Now imagine if instead of static rigid information that you were merely presenting, you had to tell a story using that information that people actually wanted to read.
I outline all of my stories because it makes sense. I am dealing with a huge amount of information that I am required to order so that another person can read and enjoy. My task becomes greatly simplified if I first figure out what will be happening, if I first build in symbolism, nuance, and who the characters are before I actually put anything down on paper. Now, you could read something I write and say what I write is awful (You will have a tough time being a harsher critic than I already am for myself), but even if I do write terribly, I still hold that you should outline any major piece of writing.