McAnally's (The Community Pub) > Author Craft
The I'm Writing Thread.... Celebrate your pages written etc Part II.
The Deposed King:
--- Quote from: Ulfgeir on January 19, 2014, 01:33:00 AM ---So far my new year's promise to write every day seems to be holding, even if I don't write much every day. My steampunk-story (which sadly just lay waiting for a few years due to writer's block), is now up to slightly over 14 000 words. Yay me. Hopefully,I will be finished with this wretched chapter as well as the next one before the end of January.
edit: it takes extra time since I write it in English (which isn't my native language), and I simpy want it to be perfect, so lots of editing while I write. Yes, I know that is a deadly sin. =^_^=
/Ulfgeir
--- End quote ---
Yep ;D Editing while writing leads to, in my experience, low word production, frustration with your story and worst of all writers block. Because either it sucks or you think you've finally got something cool and you don't want to risk messing it up.
But so long as its working for you don't stop!
The Deposed King
Paynesgrey:
He's preaching stone gospel there. You'll keep fixing and fixing and never move forward. Caught myself doing this. First draft is nothing more than putting the ideas on paper. Second draft is where you start on de-cludging the cludgicals and polishing the wordcraft, adjusting the beginning of the story to be consistent with things you did later, etc. But you've got to get the complete idea down first, in my (limited) experience.
the neurovore of Zur-En-Aargh:
--- Quote from: Paynesgrey on January 19, 2014, 03:26:38 AM ---He's preaching stone gospel there. You'll keep fixing and fixing and never move forward. Caught myself doing this. First draft is nothing more than putting the ideas on paper. Second draft is where you start on de-cludging the cludgicals and polishing the wordcraft, adjusting the beginning of the story to be consistent with things you did later, etc. But you've got to get the complete idea down first, in my (limited) experience.
--- End quote ---
Like most bits of writing advice, true for some people and not others. I can't make forward motion on a story when I know it's wrong in some ways, but there's a definite balance between fixing the things that need fixing to fit together, and not getting stuck such that you get no forward motion at all.
Paynesgrey:
Yup. Mileage may very. If something that's story-crucial is completely borked, I can't go on until I fix that either... but the clunky sentences and wonky paragraphs I force myself to wait for. Kept doing the Eternal Rewrite Loop on the first 30K.
The Deposed King:
--- Quote from: Paynesgrey on January 20, 2014, 05:06:24 AM ---Yup. Mileage may very. If something that's story-crucial is completely borked, I can't go on until I fix that either... but the clunky sentences and wonky paragraphs I force myself to wait for. Kept doing the Eternal Rewrite Loop on the first 30K.
--- End quote ---
Dialogue and Content that just aren't doing what you want it to, I might stare at for a while until I get it right. Maybe once a week go back to something a day or two before and make sure the converstation says what I want or that I emphasized they got up and the a-crack of dawn so that people aren't scratching their heads when two chapters later other people are just waking up.
But if I do that every time, every day I'd never get anything. You've got to give yourself permission to come back later and puff it up. Otherwise that's all I'm doing and forward motion stalls.
The Deposed King
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