I’m not setting out to make it a clever book (though it will have clever bits in it ), as I want it to have as wide an audience as possible and want it to be an easy read.
One piece of advice I recently picked up was NOT to edit whilst writing and I just wanted to ask if this seemed like a good idea to any of you writers out there?
It obviously feels a little alien to me - being used to editing work as I go - but I was told the best way to write - and the best way to write what you really FEEL is …to just write! And not to worry about the words you use or the structure of the sentences etc.
Your views on this - and any advice you could offer would be much appreciated!
This feels like IMHO territory to me. but here are some thoughts.
Writers vary a great deal; there certainly is no “one size fits all” approach. Try producing a chapter using the “just write” scheme and see if you like the result.
I know this wouldn’t work for me. In order to be happy with what I write, I must spend a lot of time reviewing and revising what I’ve just set down to ensure it has a sound I like - that it really is saying what I intended. If I wrote several pages without doing this, the work of going back and doing so after the fact would be daunting.
Pretty cool. I would like to offer up the book* First Draft In 30 Days: A Novel Writer’s System for Building a Complete and Cohesive Manuscript*.
It oversells itself I think, but it does a nice job of helping you organize your thoughts. Of course, as the book keeps saying, there is no wrong way to right a book.
It’s a good technique: write the book in a single draft, then go back and edit. It helps you to concentrate on the story and also focuses you better. If you write one thing, it’s better to run with it than to go back and change things. My best writing is done that way.
But different things work for different writers. If you can write well this way, great. If you need to edit as you write, that’s fine, too.
Although posters in General Questions are the smartest on the boards , I’ll move this one to Cafe Society, where you may get additional help from writers/editors.
Im very interested to hear what works for others and how and when they feel they write best - which times of the day, editing as they go along? staying with the story to edit all later etc?
I can certainly see quite a few pros and cons on both sides already!
Looking forward to hearing more, and thanks in advance!
Kurt Vonnegut wrote that there are two types of writers: bashers and swoopers. Bashers write word for word, sentence for sentence over and over until they are exactly, precisely right. Swoopers write the book and then go back and rewrite it until it’s right. Vonnegut himself is the best example of a basher in existence, I think. He spends ungodly amounts of time on each sentence and each page, but once he’s finished with a book, then by God it’s finished and off to the editors with the manuscript.
In my writing, I have often tried to be a basher but succumbed to laziness and promised myself to go back and edit later. Never happens for me. I just don’t have the discipline to go back and rewrite a story that I feel I’ve finished already. So if I’m ever going to write anything publishable, I have to learn to do it the Vonnegut way.
What works best for you is something you’re going to have to discover. Good luck!
Thank for that Priceguy! I think I like the sound of Vonnegut! Sounds like the sort of guy who was more than pleased when word processing took over big style from handwritten manuscripts!
I am TEMPTED to edit as I go I have to say - it just seemed like a credible tip in some ways to go with the flow and NOT stop to do so.
Also, when I write, I write reams! Feels like I have MASSES of words just waiting to be let onto the page!
Maybe I should consider a day writing, a day editing, a day writing, a day editing!
I write the whole thing, then go back and edit. (Not that I’ve ever published a book or anything; but I do freelance writing and I use this technique with articles.) Best thing for me, if I have time, is to finish the draft and then put the thing in a folder somewhere and force myself not to look at it for about a week. Then when I go back and edit it, I can see it with fresh eyes.
If I try to edit as I write, I get bogged down. I start making big structural changes to the piece which I think will work (but I’m not sure because I haven’t finished it yet). So I save the new version with a new name. Now I’m adding to two versions. Or more. And I keep playing around with them, and going round in circles, and getting bogged down, and I never advance, and it never gets done.
This has also happened to me when I participated in a writers’ group. We were all writing draft novels, and submitting them (online) for one another’s criticism. The criticism I got was all really good and helpful, but if I tried to implement it on a chapter-by-chapter basis, I spent all my time editing and never writing.
Here’s my best advice: never listen to anybody else’s advice.
Writing is intensely personal. Figure out what works best for you. This might not even be the same approach on different projects, but that’s what trial and error is for.
It does not matter how anybody else in the world writes. The only reason to notice is to see if there’s something you haven’t tried that might work for you. Otherwise, ignore them.
Not exactly a novel. But the One act plays I have written are usually written at all at once then gone over, and over and over. I find that if I have the framework of the story completed, I can add the intersting twists and emelishments after.
Especially when I can take a week or so to walk away and look at the thing with fresh eyes.
I also find it more rewarding when I can suddenly come up with a new angle and readjust the story from a certain point thus changing the entire tone. When you hit something you feel really improves a story it can be quite a thrill.
That being said, and as others have pointed out, it is an individual thing. Just write the way that makes you feel most comfortable, and above all enjoy what you are doing. Good luck.
Now I can JUST see myself doing that…getting it all down and then slipping in something new that adds a little more interest when Im supposed to OLY be editing whats ALREADY there!
Think setting it aside once done and going back to it with fresh eyes sounds like good advice - get a fresh take on it as you read it again.
Exapno Mapcase
Also sounds good - listen to all, hear all, but do what you feel is right for you.
That is EXACTLY what I am wanting to do. Hear ALL (from the best of course) and then take from it what I think will work for me.
Generally?
Given the choice, do you find that you tend to sit and write every day? Do you write when you FEEL like writing, or write to a schedule in order to get a certain number of words down?
Vonnegut made a comment in one of his books of essays that most men tend to edit as they write, writing a few pages or a chapter then editing it before moving on, while most women writers tend to write the first draft, then go back and edit. I’ve no idea if that’s true.
I’m not published, but personally I like to get a complete section (chapter or whatever) out as soon as possible, delineate or discover its arc, and then go back and edit continually.
Do the writers amongst you all know exactly where your book is heading before you even begin t write or do some have an idea, but let it develop as you go along
No. What I’m writing is autobiographical, and even though it’s based on real events and peoples I don’t always know where it’s going to end up. I’ll start a story about, for example, my mother attempting suicide that’s meant to be dramatic and profound and then I’ll think to myself “Damn this is funny! It really needs to be funny more than dramatic” and I’ll rewrite it to emphasize the humor. I’ve done the opposite- a story about an exhibitionist great aunt that was meant to be comedic but the story itself wanted to be a sad and dramatic account of the horrors of her decades of incarceration in a snakepit mental hospital. (When I say “the story wanted” I hope it doesn’t sound psychotic, but you’ll see what I mean in that after a while the story begins to take on a sort of will of its own- as long as you don’t feed it or sacrifice small mammals to it or anything I think it’s no problem.) I’ve also written what I call “Fonzie supplantation” stories in that the person I intend to be the main character becomes a supporting character as a supporting character just comes across as far too interesting to put in the background (like Fonzie taking over Happy Days).
What an excellent post Sampiro - thank you. Thats EXACTLY what I feel might be my way too. Starting off with one plan / in one direction and ending up heading off in another! I think its an excellent idea to think of your story as having a mind - and a direction - of its own. I like that. Sort of guided by the story as opposed to how you want the story to be?
I have a feeling the LENGTH of this book may increase by the day!
Each time I sit down to write - and bear in mind here I can write for Britain - I find lots MORE things to write about than were originally in my plan! It scares me a bit that Im going to end up with just too much stuff and not kbow what to leave out! I probably won’t want to take ANYTHING out, but appreciate that its probably one of the things that wil decide if its a good book or not !
May I ask? How far are you in your autobiography, how long has it taken up to now, and are you enjoying writing it still?
When I write I have a couple of key scenes in my head and the ending, how I get there is the adventure. I don’t know if others have the same experience but when I get into a groove I sometimes find myself surprised by what a character might suddenly do or say out of the blue. I want to see what happens next.
Yes I know I’m the one writing, but when I get into that zone it almost feels like everything takes a life of its own. Anyone ever have that happen?
), as I want it to have as wide an audience as possible and want it to be an easy read.