"The process of rewriting is enjoyable, because you're not in that existential panic when you don't have a novel at all." Rose Tremain
I come across a lot of writers who love the editing process. It's where they get to polish everything, to make their story and their characters shine. They enjoy seeing their novel beginning to take on real shape, cutting out the excess, adding the final touches of colour. Improving, sharpening, purifying. They enjoy the calmness of editing in contrast to the trepidation of laying their story out for the first time.
"In the morning, after hard work, I took a comma out of one sentence…. In the afternoon I put it back again." Oscar Wilde
And then there are writers like me; writers who are in love with the excitement of a new idea, of not knowing where they're headed. Writers who would far rather play around with a brand new idea or character than redrafting something they've finished. Editing becomes a chore, and is easily set aside in preference for any other kind of distraction.
If you fall into the latter category of writer, there are some things that you can do to make editing seem like less of a chore:
- Take a break. When you've finished the first draft put it away in a drawer for a month. But don't just leave it there forever. Mark on your calendar when you have to get it out again and stick to it.
- Set yourself goals. Edit 5 pages a day, or 2 chapters in a week. Just take it a page at a time.
- Don't spend every minute of the day on it. Take breaks and work on that new exciting new project now and again.
- Find the excitement again; add in a new character, write an entire new chapter, or even design a book cover.
- Read it out loud. Reading aloud will help you pick up on clumsy sentence structure, repetition and spelling and grammar mistakes.
I've gotta go along with reading outloud just before it's 'finished.' Nuts how much you catch that way!
ReplyDeleteIt is always a surprise isn't it? That's always got to be my top tip for any writer.
ReplyDeleteHi Angeline - love the blog, thanks for the link! Your tip to leave it in a drawer for a while is bang on. By the time you get it out again you'll have moved on emotionally to another project and can go back to the work with much more objective eyes - much more able to hunt out and destroy "those little darlings" with the required ruthlessness - plus it's amazing to find sometimes that you have forgotten some stuff. I'd also break the edit into phases - the first being a structural one - is everything where it needs to be and where it has the most impact? Are there inconsistencies etc? Are all the characters doing a job? Are there inconsistencies? etc. Once I'm happy with the structure I'd look again maybe this time for viewpoint issues, then for tightening the writing and finally a proof for spelling etc. Breaking it donw into several passes may seem like it makes more work but I don't find it so daunting if I'm focussing on and fixing a single specific aspect at a time.
ReplyDeleteProfessional writing seems like no fun. Writing because you've got nothing better to do is another matter...
ReplyDeleteI tend to enjoy writing the first draft more, but I'm one of those edit-as-you-go writers, so my first drafts take a bit longer than they probably should. When I get to the editing stage, it's fun at first to take a red pen to my work, but then it gets tedious.
ReplyDeleteI'm new to your blog, nice to "meet" you!