‘We are all unsure of ourselves. Every one of us walking the planet wonders, secretly, if we are getting it wrong. We stumble along. We love and we lose. At times, we find unexpected strength, and at other times, we succumb to our fears. We are impatient. We want to know what’s around the corner, and the writing life won’t offer us this. It forces us into the here and now. There is only this moment, when we put pen to page.’ Annie Dillard
This week I’ve embarked on the first big edit of my new novel. Editing your novel is a pleasure – after all – the hard, creative work’s been done, the words are on the page, but it can also be a cause of difficulty and pain. Personally I find it a very up and down process. One day I think it’s all working very well, another I’m unconvinced.
Talking in the Robert McCrum’s Radio 4 series – The Sins of Literature, Martin Amis reflects that while it’s a wonderful life being a writer we must expect some suffering. He goes on to describe the way we can come to a scene or a chapter and feel what we’ve written is ‘dead.’ It is then he says that our suffering begins. ‘We say to ourselves, this novel’s no good, all my other novels are no good…’ But don’t despair because according to Amis it is only here that we can really begin. In other words this lack of confidence, this doubt are a necessary part of being a writer and a necessary part of editing your novel. Without some doubt we are not in a position to take the critical distance on our writing, that’s needed for this editing process.
This editing process requires that we look at our work afresh, so we must expect doubt, but we need to be careful that the doubt is justified not crippling and we don’t throw out the good stuff. When suffering from all consumming doubt of the ‘this is no good, my writing is no good,’ type, about the whole of the work, my advice is come away, stop editing your novel. Do something else for a day or two – leave the novel/story/poem and return a few days later.
As far as the ‘dead scene’ doubt is concerned. There will always be paragraphs, scenes, chapters even, that need work in truly bringing them to life, in improving the writing, the flow, the clarity, the freshness. I believe you should concentrate your efforts here.
For some detailed and enabling advice on high quality editing see my writing buddy Wendy Robertson’s post HERE:
http://lifetwicetasted.blogspot.co.uk/search?q=Editing+your+novel
For my previous posts on editing search in the categories for Editing Your Novel
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