by Elizabeth S. Craig @elizabethscraig
I was recently working on revisions when I realized I wasn’t 100% happy with a particular scene.
I thought the beginning was ‘okay.’ But the more I looked at it, the more it really started bothering me.
I tried approaching it from a couple of different directions. I switched one scene with another as a lead-in.
Then I revised a long scene and made it much shorter.
I took out a phone conversation that I realized was unnecessary and instead started the next scene with the person doing the action they’d discussed on the phone.
Some of the sentences seemed longer than needed, so I broke them up into shorter ones, which made them read a lot smoother.
After all these changes, it was much better. But it still wasn’t the beginning I knew it could be.
I decided to pretend that I hadn’t written the beginning at all—that it didn’t exist.
I rewrote the entire first chapter, using a different approach. The nice thing about word processing is that we can easily see which one works better and cut and paste the different beginnings in.
The first beginning had a lot of set-up written in. I incorporated it with humor, but a duck is a duck. It was set-up. And set-up slows down the pace—and is boring.
With the second beginning, I ditched the set-up. Instead I included foreshadowing to let the reader know to keep an eye on a particular character.
I completely removed, in my rewrite, several passages that were unnecessary. For example: I needed to have a particular character at another character’s house. In the original beginning, I’d had a whole sequence to set that visit up. Boring.
In the second version, I just opened the scene with the visit and put in a passing reference to it in dialogue, “I’m glad you could come by, Jill, and help me out…”
Looking back at what I did, I’m thinking now that I should just immediately have done a total rewrite of the entire first chapter. Instead I spent a lot of time doing surface work on something that had a deeper problem. Yes, it did read better when I changed scenes around and toyed with my sentence structure. But, for this instance anyway, I got much better results with the radical rewrite.
Update Oct. 2011—I’m actually doing a lot of revision work right now and have again noticed that rewriting a scene can be much better, time-wise, than tinkering with a badly-written scene in twenty different ways. I also tend to get better results. It helps, I think, if I haven’t memorized the old scene…and only know the gist of it and what I’m trying to accomplish.
Have you had success with radical rewrites?
Note—this post is part of my Retro Wednesdays that I’m running to help me find extra writing time through the end of the year. This post first ran in December 2009.
It is sometimes easier to just rewrite a scene that just isn’t right at its core, that’s for sure! I’ve gone through the same thing before, revising and revising until I realized I just had to scrap it and start over. As hard as that is, sometimes it’s what we have to do.
Yes, I’ve done radical rewrites with short stories. You’re right that tinkering takes longer than just doing a radical rewrite!
Elizabeth – I’m glad you re-ran this post. It’s a good reminder that sometimes, starting over again is really the best choice. I had to do that with the manuscript I recently finished, and although it was hard, it was worth it. Starting over lets you go at writing with fewer preconceptions that get a story stuck.
I suffer that same plight. We hate to discard what we’ve already worked hard on, so the temptation is to try to ‘fix’ instead of admitting that if we know the story, we should be able to re-tell it in a stronger fashion.
I’m dealing with that now, trying to incorporate a rejected projects into a new book, and the urge to keep what’s already been written intact, instead of simply using the broader premise of a scene is always hovering.
Terry
Terry’s Place
Romance with a Twist–of Mystery
Excellent re-post! Yep, I like to throw it right out and try again. Sometimes I just speak out loud about what I’m trying to accomplish and find the way in I need. Radical rewrites are like radical anything – they get right to the crux of the problem.
Radical – Arising from or going to a root or source; basic: proposed a radical solution to the problem. 2. Departing markedly from the usual or customary; extreme: radical ..
Heather–I always keep the cut text in a separate file in case I need it. I never use it, though.
Laura–You wouldn’t think it would, but it definitely seems to!
Margot–It’s true–when we’re working with a passage that *doesn’t* work, it definitely helps just to start from scratch.
Jan–Right to the root! It feels extreme when I’m doing it, but I’m liking the results I get.
Thanks for reposting this as I didn’t see it the first time. I’m getting more and more ruthless. I recently cut something out that someone I trust had been advising me to cut out for years. I finally listened, and it was so liberating. That is germane to this post because one change means that a lot of other parts need to be revised as well. I’m not dreading it- I’m actually kind of looking forward to it :-)
Well, I sort of just did that with my entire WIP. I started with a fresh file, thinking I’ve be pasting in a lot from the earlier version but ended up bringing over very little. Just didn’t fit anymore.
The first step is admitting there is a problem… Not always easy for me! I’ve slashed too much and not enough. I’m only just now learning that sometimes one sentence added or taken away does the trick. But, you’re right, sometimes if it’s not working it’s best to tear the entire scene apart. Limb from limb.
I had far more radical rewrites with my first book. The second two (yet to be released) went much smoother. Rewrites can be frustrating but are necessary. Better to slay a sacred cow now than have to do it later.
I learned this the sloooow way on my first novel. Sometimes, I produce bad writing and the only way to fix it is to start over. It may be a scene and it may be a chapter, but I’ve learned to buckle down, pull out a blank MS page, and dip into my imagination anew.
Thanks for writing this. I’m glad I’m not the only one who has to start over from scratch sometimes.
Deb–There’s something really satisfying, I think, in *fixing* something that didn’t work. I really hate it the whole time I’m revising, but it’s wonderful at the end to see how much it’s improved.
LD Masterson–I bet it’s *so* much better, though! I’ve been tempted to do that before…actually, I’m tempted to do it with this backlist title that’s been bothering me so much.
Jessica–Lately, I’ve just taken the entire problem scene, selected it on Word, cut it, and pasted it into another document with another name! I don’t even want it in there because it tends to mess me up. As long as I know the gist of it, I can rework it pretty well.
Terry–Sometimes it seems like it should just be easier to tweak all the things we notice about a bad scene–but it’s just so time consuming and such a pain. I’m doing a lot more rewrites than I used to.
Stephen–Exactly! That’s what second drafts are all about. :)
Olene–I always feel some resistance to starting from scratch each time I do it…but then I’m so glad I did. I think I save a ton of time in the long run.
Oh boy, do I relate to this! I’m in revisions and I’ve been wasting so much time doing cosmetic fixes when big ones were required. Just had a breakthrough like yours today–realized I didn’t need a whole scene. Thanks for putting it so well.
Radical rewrites are particularly useful for a beginning, because you were very often “exploring” the idea when you wrote the beginning.
It is still hard for me to throw away major chunks of text but, yes, sometimes a radical rewrite is just the ticket.
Sometimes if I try to revise a problem scene, I get lulled back into it by reading over my old words and that’s when complacency can start to creep in.
Glad your rewrites were a success!
I haven’t had to do a major rewrite – yet. I’ve cut a few scenes, but for the most part, I end up adding major scenes.
Off topic, but I just had a marketing idea which might also work in other small communities. If so, I thought you might want to add it to one of your helpful posts.
I had a haircut today and spent the time telling my hairdresser about my ebooks. She was very happy to accept a small folder with a couple of flash fiction stories for her customers (+ sales info on the backside, of course).
Love this. Very useful. I already have a re-write of several chapters in mind for my current WIP. Leaving them alone until I reach the end, then going back. No fiddling, just re-writing.
Great post. I recently rewrote a first chapter, which then turned into several chapters. Before I knew it, I re-wrote the entire WiP, keeping only the things I adored and scratching the rest.
I’m so much happier with it now.
Oh revisions and edits are always fun. Perfecting the scene that we see and feel while trying to convey it, do it justice. I’ve wiped out entire chapters before and it certainly looks daunting but the end result always looks better.