The Dreaditorial Process

I don't like to edit my work. In fact, I don't do it. I write poems once and, although I frequently read over them, I will not edit them. On the exceedingly rare occasion that I make a change, it is usually at the suggestion of someone that has read the poem. Even more seldom, I will make the change solely on my own but even this can hardly be called editing. The same is true with blogs. Or news articles. Or essays or college papers. I wrote them, once, and rarely ever touched them again.

It is something of a gift, I suppose (and humbly so) that I can most often compose these things fully with very little editing. I attribute that mostly to my forethought. Nothing ever goes down on paper stream-of-conscious. I have an idea and I work on that idea for some time. With poems (and the reason my poetry tends to run fairly short) I typically get them fully-formed and I'll play around with the actual verse and line structures as I write. With blogs and other sorts of extrapolative writing, I tend to wait until I have a fair idea of what I'm going to say before I sit down to start writing. Occasionally I'll even leave off if I run out of steam before I've reached any meaningful conclusion.

The rest of that gift I attribute to my massive brain, but that's neither here nor there. (Seriously, guys, its just, its so big, you don't even know.)

The point is, that my issue in writing lies with the editing that is inherently involved. Sure, those essays all got high marks and the poems are typically well-received and even the blogs (although I've noticed the occasional grammatical error and gone back to fix it) are mostly solid on the first try. Even that doesn't mean they don't deserve editing. Perhaps they don't need editing (but then, I've seen a few of my older blog posts that could use more than a fine-toothed comb), but they would very likely benefit from it.

The big issue then, of course, is novel-length fiction. For the sake of brevity we'll include novella-length and short stories in there as well (I'm not prone to them because I'm long winded, but the one promising short story I have has a number of kinks to work out). When it comes to writing novels, especially when you don't take any notes or do any meaningful planning (as was the case with my work for so long) you're bound to have glaring inconsistencies, scenes that plain don't work, issues with voice and continuity and a slew of other problems, catastrophic and mundane, that make the work, shall we say, less than polished.

Its worthy of note that I enjoy editing, commenting, collaborating, and critiquing material that isn't my own. I feel that the process is very informative, very helpful, and I'm as grateful to the people that ask for my opinions (or proofreading services) on their own work as the people who offer their services to mine. I simply can't be bothered to read and edit my own material.

I'm changing that. Slowly.

In his book On Writing, Stephen King suggests (and I've read and seen and heard it in countless places since finishing that fine book) that when you complete something, be it a novel or a haiku, to set it aside and work on something different for a period of time. Don't look at it, don't think on it (at least, not intentionally), don't focus on it. Let your mind become engrossed in another project. Only after you have some distance from that work, should you go back and explore it. I like this idea. I like it a lot.

For me, the process has always gone one of two ways: Either I'm so pleased with what I've just read that I overlook the things that need work and puff myself up about how great I am, or, I find so many unbelievable shortcomings that I start over from scratch (once again, not taking notes or planning) and re-write the entire thing. My first novel, Eve of the Dragonspeaker, has been re-written half a dozen times in the ten-ish years since I started writing it. That's 300,000 plus words. Re-written at least six times. Holy shit. What a waste, right? So I finished it, back in college, and I haven't looked at it since. I picked up poetry and blogging, I finished another novel (called For Glory because I'm awful with titles) and finished that before moving onto this current project, both the new blog and Skyborn, the new novel (which has a fucking awesome title).

I decided that, in conjunction with using this blog to run on and on about writing and all the wonderful things that come with exploring myself as a writer and the world of a new novel and the work of people I associate with, that I'd use it to help my editorial process. In the meantime, I also took on a little side project. And by little, I mean enormous and by "in the meantime" I mean I agreed to do it a decade ago and have finally gotten around to tackling it.

Its called Star Rider (Or maybe Starrider), and its this brilliant sci-fi epic my father wrote over a period of time that started in the early to mid-70s and underwent re-writes and catastrophes and idea-spawning until...this morning. So far.

The story itself is wonderfully creative, its an absolute joy to read, but it has some technical issues. It also has a number of components that could be called nasty things like "copyright infringement" or "plagiarism" or "bullshit science". Those kinks need to be smoothed out and some of the narrative needs a loving, editorial hand and some other things need to be fleshed out to make the story, and its universe, really come alive. Its an incredible beginning, but it needs some significant work.

This project, for me, is sort of a hybrid. It's someone else's work, obviously, but my father and I think enough alike and have had enough discussions about the story in the past few years (and he's given me enough leeway with this) that it almost feels like I've had a hand in creating it. So, here's what I plan to do:

In conjunction with this blog and my other pursuits, I'm writing Skyborn. At the same time, I'm editing Star Rider and, as its been four years since I last saw it, Eve of the Dragonspeaker. Now, if that sounds ambitious or like a ton of work, well, its both of those things. I don't expect it to be a fast process, or an easy one, but its a worthwhile endeavor. What I will do, though, is welcome suggestions.

If you have an idea for how to tackle the tremendous task of editing an entire novel (or two) feel free to hurl them in my direction. Would a full read-through be best, to acclimate myself with the material again? Should I go chapter-by-chapter? Should I consult a therapist first? I'll keep this as a running sub-series on the blog (probably) so feel free to chime in at anytime.

Delightfully, Deliriously Yours,
-S.R.