Wednesday, July 07, 2004
Evaluating and Revising
Writing Book I’m reading:
Crafting Prose by Don Richard Cox and Elizabeth Giddens
Chapter 4: Evaluating and revising:
Evaluating and revising is shifting from writer based to reader based. I find it easier to revise work when I have put it away for a while. The longer I go without looking at it, the more distance I can get and more objective I can be.
Remember everything you write will make sense to you. You will tend to have a predetermined belief that is says what you mean. It helps to have someone else read what you have written and find out if something is unclear to them.
The writer must pamper the reader. It is your job to win the reader over, not the reader’s job to read/like/understand what you have written. Now is the time to decide what you need to change during revision.
Now (when you have a finished first draft) would be a good time to outline your draft and make a note of what each paragraph say/does. Evaluate if it fits in with what you want to say. The outline can help you decide what to keep, discard, and change or clarify.
Options for evaluating:
Take a break so that you are reading as if you are seeing the draft for the first time.
List the drafts strengths and weaknesses.
Get help from a friend. Ask the friend questions and see if they understood what you tried to say.
Outline the draft.
Read the draft aloud.
Get a critique from another writer.
Reading a draft critically (for someone else):
1 Remember you are helping someone find the weaknesses in the draft
2 Don’t be too nice or too cruel.
3 Don’t say it’s “okay” or “pretty good.” This is the worst thing you can say.
4 Identify areas that don’t follow the main idea.
5 Identify areas that are hard to understand.
6 Is it organized?
7 Does the beginning draw you in? (Most people decide to read or stop reading in the first paragraph. It should be the most intriguing part of the story.)
8 Is the ending satisfying and does it complete the story? Are you left with questions hanging?
9 Suggest ways to improve the conclusion by adding something memorable at the ending.
REVISING:
This is what I refer to as “deeper work” that makes a good story great.
Revising means “seeing again.”
You may:
Find a whole new idea about your story
Make the story more accessible to the reader
Add to the story to make it more interesting
Cut out everything that adds nothing or is irrelevant to the story
Refine the story
Revision won’t be as difficult if you have not struggled so much with the first draft. It is hard to cut out words, sentences, and paragraphs if you slaved to get the perfect word down during the first draft, or if you worked hard to get the punctuation just right.
Early in revising, look at the big picture. Get near to a final draft before you start using your thesaurus or correcting grammar. “Polishing” should be the last thing you do.
Start out revising by thinking big, considering the reader, make the story interesting, support your ideas, trim out dead ends, discover if there are new questions arising from your changes. Then move on to phrasing of sentences, word choices, note fuzzy spots, look out for clichés and get rid of those, clarify vague terms such as loyalty (what that means to you may be different to someone else), choose a title, polish, read backwards, look for your most common errors, prepare your final copy.
Don’t let this process go on forever. You must find a spot where you are happy with what you have written.
WHAT IS SUCCESS?
This could mean many things to many people. I am not going to note what the book says but present my own ideas…
To me success can be just finishing a story. It can be having someone read it and enjoy it. It can be an acceptance to a magazine.
Or it could be none of those things. But I feel I succeed every time I finish a story. For every one I complete, I have learned a great deal about writing. I have heard that every writer must write one million words before they get to their own “great” writing. I hope to get finished with those million words someday and begin writing “great!”
FOCUS/SUGGESTIONS FOR WRITING:
What is the percentage of time you spend prewriting, drafting, revising, and editing?
Prewriting (10%) drafting (30%) revising (20%) editing (40%)
These numbers are approximate!!
Writing Book I’m reading:
Crafting Prose by Don Richard Cox and Elizabeth Giddens
Part II: Crafting Expressive Prose
I am hoping this section will be more interesting and more relative to fiction writing than the first four chapters!!!
Concerns in expressive prose: Remember expressive prose is writer oriented. Not because it is written only for ourselves, but because it is written to express our feelings, thoughts, and emotions.
Comments-[ comments.]
Crafting Prose by Don Richard Cox and Elizabeth Giddens
Chapter 4: Evaluating and revising:
Evaluating and revising is shifting from writer based to reader based. I find it easier to revise work when I have put it away for a while. The longer I go without looking at it, the more distance I can get and more objective I can be.
Remember everything you write will make sense to you. You will tend to have a predetermined belief that is says what you mean. It helps to have someone else read what you have written and find out if something is unclear to them.
The writer must pamper the reader. It is your job to win the reader over, not the reader’s job to read/like/understand what you have written. Now is the time to decide what you need to change during revision.
Now (when you have a finished first draft) would be a good time to outline your draft and make a note of what each paragraph say/does. Evaluate if it fits in with what you want to say. The outline can help you decide what to keep, discard, and change or clarify.
Options for evaluating:
Take a break so that you are reading as if you are seeing the draft for the first time.
List the drafts strengths and weaknesses.
Get help from a friend. Ask the friend questions and see if they understood what you tried to say.
Outline the draft.
Read the draft aloud.
Get a critique from another writer.
Reading a draft critically (for someone else):
1 Remember you are helping someone find the weaknesses in the draft
2 Don’t be too nice or too cruel.
3 Don’t say it’s “okay” or “pretty good.” This is the worst thing you can say.
4 Identify areas that don’t follow the main idea.
5 Identify areas that are hard to understand.
6 Is it organized?
7 Does the beginning draw you in? (Most people decide to read or stop reading in the first paragraph. It should be the most intriguing part of the story.)
8 Is the ending satisfying and does it complete the story? Are you left with questions hanging?
9 Suggest ways to improve the conclusion by adding something memorable at the ending.
REVISING:
This is what I refer to as “deeper work” that makes a good story great.
Revising means “seeing again.”
You may:
Find a whole new idea about your story
Make the story more accessible to the reader
Add to the story to make it more interesting
Cut out everything that adds nothing or is irrelevant to the story
Refine the story
Revision won’t be as difficult if you have not struggled so much with the first draft. It is hard to cut out words, sentences, and paragraphs if you slaved to get the perfect word down during the first draft, or if you worked hard to get the punctuation just right.
Early in revising, look at the big picture. Get near to a final draft before you start using your thesaurus or correcting grammar. “Polishing” should be the last thing you do.
Start out revising by thinking big, considering the reader, make the story interesting, support your ideas, trim out dead ends, discover if there are new questions arising from your changes. Then move on to phrasing of sentences, word choices, note fuzzy spots, look out for clichés and get rid of those, clarify vague terms such as loyalty (what that means to you may be different to someone else), choose a title, polish, read backwards, look for your most common errors, prepare your final copy.
Don’t let this process go on forever. You must find a spot where you are happy with what you have written.
WHAT IS SUCCESS?
This could mean many things to many people. I am not going to note what the book says but present my own ideas…
To me success can be just finishing a story. It can be having someone read it and enjoy it. It can be an acceptance to a magazine.
Or it could be none of those things. But I feel I succeed every time I finish a story. For every one I complete, I have learned a great deal about writing. I have heard that every writer must write one million words before they get to their own “great” writing. I hope to get finished with those million words someday and begin writing “great!”
FOCUS/SUGGESTIONS FOR WRITING:
What is the percentage of time you spend prewriting, drafting, revising, and editing?
Prewriting (10%) drafting (30%) revising (20%) editing (40%)
These numbers are approximate!!
Writing Book I’m reading:
Crafting Prose by Don Richard Cox and Elizabeth Giddens
Part II: Crafting Expressive Prose
I am hoping this section will be more interesting and more relative to fiction writing than the first four chapters!!!
Concerns in expressive prose: Remember expressive prose is writer oriented. Not because it is written only for ourselves, but because it is written to express our feelings, thoughts, and emotions.
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