What I meant to say was...
Thursday, October 11, 2012 at 1:17PM 
Word count: 428 Reading time: 1-2 minutes
I’ve been told – and found it on the internet so it must be true – that the best way to wash a car is to do it twice. I don’t have a lot of patience with cars so mine’s lucky if it gets a single wash every couple of months. I’m like that with a lot of jobs. I’ll never create a dessert so beautiful that guests won’t want to eat it. I’ll never produce an awesome needlepoint or restore an old piece of furniture. I know. I’ve tried. These are all endeavours where the that-will-do-factor cuts in really early.
But writing? A different story: the more I do it, the greater my patience is for rewriting and the easier I accept other people’s input. So I understand what Bernard Malamud meant when he said, “I would write a book, or a short story, at least three times--once to understand it, the second time to improve the prose, and a third to compel it to say what it still must say.”
When writers forget this essential part of the writing process and rush to bring their work to the world by way of poorly-edited self-pubbed books they risk terrible remorse down the road as discussed by Suw Charman-Anderson of Forbes. They risk alienating readers who might have enjoyed their work if they had just given it a little more patience.
I'm sure there are writers whose flawless first drafts are ready for global release but John Irving’s words resonated with me: “More than a half, maybe as much as two-thirds of my life as a writer is rewriting. I wouldn't say I have a talent that's special. It strikes me that I have an unusual kind of stamina. I can rewrite sentences over and over again, and I do. . . . And I think what I've always recognized about writing is that I don't put much value in so-called inspiration. The value is in how many times you can redo something.”
I’d be delighted if I only had to write things three times like Malamud or was even close to Irving’s talent. But still, I do have the stamina to rewrite often, very often. And I hope, at the end of the process, whatever I offer the world shines like it’s been washed twice and well polished.
How do you feel about rewriting? Have you written your story at least three times? Does it finally say what it must?
***
Photos: Junkyard Car by Melissa M. Morris
Old Truck by Ron Hilton
Reader Comments (6)
I used to hate rewriting, and to be truthful I still find the 'polishing' tedious, but it really is key. Since I nailed down my (minimum three draft) revision process, I've been published far more consistently.
I don't think I began to understand my novel until I had rewritten from start to finish two or three times. In fact, it was after consulting with beta readers and working with an editor that I embarked on a full, stem-to-stern rewrite, to build in and expand upon the things I wanted to do with it, and really develop the parts of it I got strong feedback about. I didn't always agree with the feedback -- some I ignored completely. But while I keep thinking I'm on my "last rewrite" -- I have to admit that with every hard look at the WIP, and with everything I learn about how to write a novel and really develop it, the rewrites have not only been necessary, they've gotten me so much closer to the best version of the story I wanted to tell. Not sure when this process will end, but I am BEYOND glad that I never managed to get earlier versions of it published. They weren't even close to good enough, and while I was happy with them (and often fatigued with rewriting), I wasn't sure I could be proud of them. I wasn't sure I'd done enough of it as well as it needed to be done -- though I had always done my best. It's a hard thing to admit your best is not good enough... yet. But that's what will carry the work to a better level of quality. I very much agree that inspiration is not the main thing -- it's the willingness to go back ans make something better.
Hi Nicole
Thanks for stopping by.
When I first started writing I used to dread feedback and rewriting because I thought it meant I had failed in some significant way.
I don’t know how many revisions I do of a novel. Every day I revise, I save that day’s version under the current date so I have literally hundreds of soft copies of each manuscript. I hope each new version is an improvement on the one that went before but that’s not always the case.
Maggie
“Not sure when this process will end, but I am BEYOND glad that I never managed to get earlier versions of it published.”
Oh does that resonate, David-Jón!
I really didn’t know how much I didn’t know when I first started writing. The first versions of my early manuscripts are embarrassing but fortunately they aren’t ‘out there’.
The most valuable thing I’ve learned as a writer is how to accept criticism of my work without feeling it’s personal. The second part of that process, knowing whose opinion to take on board and whose to ignore, only comes with practice. A lot of practice. I"m getting better at it.
Maggie
How naive I was when I first set out, determined to write a novel in a year. After reading several of your earlier drafts of Lockdown, and seeing all the hard work you have done to bring your story to its present, wonderful state, it has given me a much better understanding of 'writing,' or rewriting as it should be called.
You are a daily inspiration to me.
Allison
Thanks, Allison.
Some people do write good novels in a single year. I admire but cannot share that claim.
I need to think about each novel for at least 12 months after the first draft. In fact, as of today, I think I may have the solution for a novel that I shelved over two years ago.
Writing really is about perseverance and hard work. In terms of being fully revised from the opening sentence to the last paragraph, Lockdown is probably on version 9 or 10 but some scenes have been revised dozens of times. I’ve read it aloud (yes, the whole thing) three times. It’s much different, much stronger, than it was when I closed the first draft at then end of NaNoWriMo in November, 2010.
Some things cannot be rushed.
Maggie