What? Don’t Edit Your First Draft???
December 30, 2007 by Anne Wayman
Filed under Jobs
Eric, over at Common Sense PR stopped me cold with this headline: Don’t Edit your First Draft
You can imagine what I thought, can’t you? I was wrong!
Go on over and read the post, then come back and tell me how many people you know who can’t get passed the first chapter, or even the first paragraph.
Write well and often,
Two newsletters:
Abundant Freelance Writing – a resource for freelance writers including 3x a week job postings.
Writing With Vision – for those who want to get a book written.
I try to write my first draft without stopping. More often than not though my inner critic starts chiming in and I go back and edit during the initial draft.
He’s absolutely right. I get stuck on editing – none of my stories are finished as a result! In fact, that’s why I signed up for the National Novel Writing Month contest this year. It forces you to move ahead and not look back. You can’t! You have no time to! :))
Hey Lori, did you finish the novel?
One hundred percent agree. Do a complete mind dump before going back and polishing. What can make it even worse when I am trying to teach kids or students is that they spend tons of time with fonts and graphics and alignment and… you get the picture.
Lol, Michael… long ago I sold some of the first personal computers and a wannabe writer came in frustrated because the system we sold him? her? had side margins not quite an inch… s/he (and I truly don’t remember) seemed convinced that if the margins were exactly as suggested in Writer’s Market the piece would sell… they didn’t believe me when I suggested they concentrate on their writing. ;)
I don’t edit as I write. I always write stream of consiousness then I go back and re-read and edit. The only time I stop the flow is to look up a piece of information. Sometimes, I don’t even stop then. I just leave a blank and fill in the info later.
Me too, Susan… my initial manuscripts are often filled with notes to myself in all caps… places where I kept writing even tho’ I knew I needed more info or something.