OK, RIDICULOUS blogule title I know. Bear with me though. It shall become clear once I explain what it's all about (Willis).
As mentioned in many places on this little page of utter irreverent twaddle, that I inflict on you all (for which I am truly sorry). I want to be a writer. Now I am currently in the midst of entering a short story competition and will be sending off my story by the end of the week. It's already written but, alas, and indeed alack, I have to edit it. I am currently over 200 words over the imposed word limit of 2,000. Those of you who are sure how this mathematics lark works will realise that this is of course, TOO MANY WORDS. Which means I have to do something that I utterly dread, editing.
I utterly hate editing my own work, it means I have to read what I wrote. Now, I know you think, well if you hate reading your stuff, it must be terrible so give up writing. Well I say, SILENCE DETRACTORS! I know what I write is good but what I hate is reading it and realising how stupid some bits now sound.
Basically I am extremely over-active with the old delete key. It is really my friend in these situations. I start deleting loads of bits and soon I'm back within the word limit, by 2000 words. Not good. I am by far and a way my own worst critic. Something that I imagine most writers are.
Anyway, I am going to try and edit this, just removing lines I feel are superfluous and then see where that takes me. Then add info to make the story more cohesive. Then re-edit it.
So, what do I do? Do I just keep on like this until I stop criticising everything I write? Do I just give in? Do I no longer edit myself and hire an imp?
hehe. I think it's likely very beneficial to edit your own work as critically as you can. I however, always need an outside view to get my focus when I edit. I be but a lowly amateur but I really like the website Scribophile where other would-be writers critique each other's writing. It's fun.
ReplyDeleteyeah, it's horrible.
ReplyDeletestill, you'll improve your work by taking bits out, and then improve it again by adding bits in, and so on. so you're doing yourself a favour.
also, as with all writing things-- the more you do it, the more you'll learn how its best for YOU to do it, so it probably won't always feel so hard.