On Rewriting
Writing, Rewriting, and Editing
Categories:
[Explore],
[Know]
Tags:
[Rewriting],
[Editing]
Once you've written out your first draft, where do you go next? Well, then it's time for some rewriting!
A New Blank Document
The boldest way to rewrite is to open a new blank document and write out your whole story a second time, either from memory or after quickly rereading your first draft. Don't copy out your first draft, though, since that will defeat the whole purpose. You can copy over particularly good sentences so they don't get lost, but the point is to actually write as much as possible a second time.
While you are rewriting, feel free to change things. Expand things. Skip things. Whatever changes you want to make to your story now that you've done a rough draft, do them now. If your ending comes out of nowhere, add some foreshadowing to the rewrites. If your characters have a clearer personality now that you've gone through the story once with them, update the things the say and do to make them stand out more. If you have a better idea what your story is actually about now, add more things to reinforce the ideas that you want.
Limited Rewriting
If doing the whole thing a second time feels kind of daunting, you can still rewrite your story in smaller pieces. Reread your story quickly, then pick the weakest part (and there will always be a part that's just not as good as the rest). Now rewrite that paragraph or scene or section so that it is better. Repeat as many times as you like, since as you improve each weak part the whole story gets better...except for whatever is now the new weakest part.
Nothing is set in stone at this stage. You can change whatever you think will make the story better. The plot can be changed, characters can be changed, and details can be changed.
Add Detail or Dialogue
If you get to the end of your first draft and you notice that it is almost all talking, go back and add descriptions among the lines of dialogue. Where are the characters? What's going on around them? What are they doing while they are talking? What are their body language or facial expressions like? What do they sound like? Are they whispering or shouting over background noise or talking normally?
Alternatively, if you finish your first draft and no one says anything in it, go back and add some dialogue. This can be as big as adding a second character to the scene so they have someone to say things out loud to as they go, or as minor as replacing summaries of conversations with a few quick lines of dialogue. Instead of just saying "she ordered a cup of coffee", actually write down what she says, and use the way she talks to say something about the character. Is the coffee order short and to the point, or does she say hello and chat a bit first? Is she polite or rude? Does she speak softly and nervously, or loudly and confidently?
There's no "correct" amount of description and dialogue, other than to say there should be at least some of each. Roughly half and half is a general goal to work towards, but it doesn't have to be exact. Just keep in mind that you are writing prose, and that's different from a screenplay (almost all dialogue) or journalism (almost all description with just a few quotes).
Make It Longer; Make It Shorter
If your first draft feels very rushed or short, use rewriting to expand out your plot. It's not a book report where you are summarizing the story down to the basics. If you end your story with "and then he saved the day, the end" it will feel very unsatisfying. How did he save the day? What was about to happen, and what would it have been like if it hadn't been stopped? How hard was it to save the day, and where did your character find the courage or cleverness or whatever to save it? Go through and turn a word into a sentence, a sentence into a paragraph, or a paragraph into a chapter.
Or, if your first draft feels very slow and boring, feel free to skip sections to get to the good bits faster. Unless there's something about the way that your character brushes their teeth that tells you about the character or the world they live in or the plot of the story or some emotion that is being felt, you can summarize it or cut it. Every part of your story should be doing something (and if it can be doing two things at the same time, even better!), and any part that isn't doing something doesn't need to be there (or needs to be made to be doing something useful in rewrites).
Writing, Rewriting, and Editing
Actually writing, ironically, is actually only a small part of creative writing. You will probably end up spending as much or more time throwing out chunks of your story or sweating over your stories word by word as you grow as a writer, and that's okay. For every word you see in a finished book, there is probably at least one word that isn't in that book because it was replaced along the way from first draft to final product.