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This week: W * R * I * T* E * R * S * Edited by: Fyn  
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3. Letter from the Editor
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You write to communicate to the hearts and minds of others what's burning inside you. And we edit to let the fire show through the smoke.~~Arthur Polotnik
Don't tell me the moon is shining; show me the glint of light on broken glass.~~Anton Chekhov
Sit down, and put down everything that comes into your head and then you're a writer. But an author is one who can judge his own stuff's worth, without pity, and destroy most of it.~~Colette
If you re-read your work, you can find on re-reading a great deal of repetition can be avoided by re-reading and editing.~~ William Safire
Writing is not like painting where you add. It is not what you put on the canvas that the reader sees. Writing is more like a sculpture where you remove, you eliminate in order to make the work visible. Even those pages you remove somehow remain.~~Elie Wiesel |
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One of the hardest lessons I learned as a beginning writer was that when I wrote a story and got to the end of it that I wasn't finished. In fact I had only just begun. Getting it through my thick skull that now I had to rewrite it didn't make sense to my younger self because i had just written it it; why then, rewrite it? Looking back when I now often rewrite-revise-edit hundreds of times, it took a while for the process of 'now-make it better' to sink in, to realize that rewriting something did not mean it was wrong or bad or not good enough; it just wasn't (yet) the best I could make it. Looking back at this sentence, I saw that rather than typing 'rewriting,' I had typed 'rewiring.'
And it is--revision is often rewiring what we've written. We clarify, strengthen, add life. We play with word choices. As writers, our aim is to communicated a thought, an idea or a story as clearly as possible. Further, we aim to communicate not just the thoughts, but the environment surrounding it; the thoughts wheeling in our character's minds, the fiber of the character's world and all that our characters are experiencing-- from the lump in the sock that is annoying them, to yesterday's sunburn being rubbed raw under the shirt collar to the rumbles of hunger due to a missed lunch. We re-vision a scene, rewrite it to communicate our vision more clearly.
Writers need to follow what I call 'The WRITERS Code.'
W-rite
R-evise
I-nnovate
T-ake Time
E-dit
R-ead it out loud
S-pellcheck
Write. Write the story, the poem, the paper. Get your thoughts down. Tell the story. Communicate your ideas. It doesn't matter if you write a chapter and then do this or the entire manuscript.
Revise. Go back over what you've written. Are your thoughts clear? Can you say it better? Did you want to expand a section/chapter/thought? Did you leave out something you need to include? Is there extra 'stuff' cluttering up what you want to say? Do you have run on sentences that go on forever and ever circling around and going nowhere and saying basically nothing at all which is possibly confusing and lets what you are saying get lost in the shuffle of verbosity? Was your mind racing along faster than your fingers can type and were le(t)ters left out? Have you written in complete sentences? Incomplete phrases? This is where you get to play with what you already have!
Innovate. Now you go back over it yet again. Do you always gravitate towards using the 'same-old-same-old' words? Without coming across as a thesaurus, can you use different words or try new ones? Are cliches cluttering up your writing? Innovate and find fresh new ways to express the thought!
Take Time. Save the file, close the notebook. Think about other things. Take care of the clothes overwhelming the hamper. Empty the sink and find your kitchen counters. Go for a walk with the kids, the dog or your spouse. Dust your living room and get the cobwebs out of your brain as well. Go for a run. Drive down a road you've never taken the time to explore. Go food shopping. Rejoin the living. Don't consciously think about what you've been writing. Subconsciously it will continue to simmer, but on the surface you need to switch tracks, and give your mind a rest and a treat!
Edit. Now it is time to go back and read from beginning to end, taking notes as you go. What works? What doesn't? What do you need? Or what do you not? Do you have the right words: Its or it's, your or you're? Does your pulse pound? Do tears threaten? What must you tighten up? What really needs more description? Are you too concise or not enough? Will your reader be able to smell the sickeningly sweet scent of the lilies perfuming the wake? Can they hear the sounds of the child using an entire roll of tape to wrap that special present? Can you feel the rough scrape of bark as the boy climbs high into the maple tree and smell the breeze wafting through the branches as he surveys his domain below? When the fisherman returns with his catch as the end of the day, when the tide is out and the sun sinks on the horizon, will the reader smell the lingering aroma of fish and drying seaweed? Will he taste the tang of the ever present salt, will his shoulders ache from the long day and his fingers still ooze from the slices of line and net? Yes? Great! No? Back to work!
Read aloud. Read what you've written out loud. Doesn't matter if you have a convenient audience or if the only one to hear it is the sleeping cat on your lap. What is important here, is that how it works when you read it; how the words roll off your tongue. Do you stumble over the words? If so, so will your reader. Do you get lost in your sentence? Then so will they. Does it sound the way you want it to? Does it resonate? Do you lapse into a sing-song-y pattern? Does the alliteration work well? Do you find your expression giving life to your words or perhaps, do you giggle at that funny part you'd forgotten about? Reading your work out loud helps give you yet another mirror and lets you hear your vision. Can you see clearly in the hearing what you wanted your reader to read?
Spell check. Why is it that folks forget this step? It is a tool to help you polish your writing. No, every spell check suggestion is not the correct one for you. But it is a tool that will allow you to catch a few more mistakes thus making your writing the best it is capable of being.
So. Are you done now? Probably not. Writers write. I will often go through this process many times by the time I think something is finished. Then I will give it to other eyes and realize that, nope, I still have a ways to go. Nature of the beast and all that. But the final result is always worth the work, effort, tears and frustrations. |
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A mother remembers the joy of children playing~A sestina poem 12/09 Quotation Inspiration
#1627458 by Mara ♣ McBain  |
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AND FINALLY, please check this out. This contest has been going on for a while and it is down to the two finalists. You can't tell who wrote what...you need to read both entries and then vote for the piece you liked the best. Simple.
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Have an opinion on what you've read here today? Then send the Editor feedback! Find an item that you think would be perfect for showcasing here? Submit it for consideration in the newsletter!
https://www.Writing.Com/go/nl_form
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| ASIN: B004PICKDS |
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LJPC - the tortoise  says: Wow, Fyn, this was an awesome NL. I'm keeping this one close. Although I doubt I'll be doing any book signings (I live in Egypt), I know a lot of people who do. Thanks for the great advice!-- Laura
miller.ck disagrees tho: I can't help but feel you've got it backwards. Great writers make for great signings. Great signings do not great writers make. I want someone to read my work because a friend recommended it, not because I wore a tie and made small talk.
My point was that it doesn't matter HOW GREAT a book you've written--if you don't 'sell' it and you at a signing, you aren't going to to sell books. Great writers have NOTHING to do with making great signings...unless, you are a household name. Then, just maybe, it might not matter because you have a massive publicity crew supporting you. For the little guy it is ALL about selling both you and the book to the public, being the advertisement for the book and doing what ever it takes to bring buyers in. This includes having friends and family show up because the basic buying public is often going to follow the herd...."Ohhh, look at the line at the book signing...must be 'someone big!' |
| ASIN: B07NPKP5BF |
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For Authors: July 13, 2011 Issue [#4499]
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