Is there a way to make editing enjoyable?

I like editing, because I like reading my story, and I feel good when I improve a passage.

However, I also edit with a specific list of things in mind. I want clarity, I want continuity. I don't want to say the same thing twice. I also want to appeal to senses, sight (including color), sound (is there music anywhere), gestures and movement while speaking, smell, what things feel like, how the character physically feels.

I call this a "fully imagined scene", and we don't have to list all these things, but in cases like dialogue we don't want just a wall of dialogue. Nor do we want uninterrupted info dumps. A bar and an office have different atmospheres, sounds and smells, a conversation in a bar is much different than one in a cubicle.

Badly worded sentences, sentences that are out of place, [continuity] errors etc.

Don't get exercised by these, they just confirm that you need to edit. I don't worry about mechanical crap, those are easy to fix. What I really want to know in editing is if the scene is the right scene, in the right place, and if I have included enough detail for the reader to imagine it, and not so much detail I have slowed the pace and will bore the reader. You have to be selective, and decide what can be cut, what can be assumed, what the reader doesn't need to be told.

Focus on the bigger picture, this is like writing code: Bugs are inevitable. Fix 'em and forget 'em. The bigger picture is in whether you are aiding the reader's imagination of the scenes, and holding their attention with tension so they are looking forward to what happens in the next few pages, by the end of the chapter, the end of the Act, and at the end of the story.

posted about 5 years ago

CC BY-SA 4.0

Amadeus‭

3166 reputation 2 1399 614 37

See editing as a different form of creation: from something not so good you create something brilliant. Frank Cottrell Boyce opened my eyes when he said that being used to writing films he was used to continually editing and re-writing, something that seemed unusual when he came to writing a novel.

Yes, discovering a word you have repeated too many times and going through and changing some of them (or something similar) is hard graft but you can derive satisfaction in doing so. See things as challenges to be overcome and then celebrated rather than problems. It's a mindset thing.

I use various grammar and style checkers after writing the second draft (I write the first by hand so that my editing will be better). These alert me to problems and save me noticing some obvious problems.

Believe that editing, making something better, is a beautiful thing. It's not a chore. It's part of the creative process.

posted about 5 years ago

CC BY-SA 4.0

S. Mitchell‭

280 reputation 1 25 55 0

See it this way: Your text has problems, if you know them or not. Even the greatest master of the craft will not be able to write a text right out of the box without any problems. Since you know up front that your text has problems, the worst thing that could happen is that you don't find them. And the best that can happen to you is that you find them.

Therefore when you find a problem, don't feel negative about the problem existing, feel positive about having found it and now being able to correct it. Finding a problem means success. Finding many problems means many successes. So you've got an endless spiral of successes!

posted about 5 years ago

CC BY-SA 4.0

celtschk‭

740 reputation 16 53 99 13