what i've been Not Writing
Feb. 17th, 2011 02:20 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
jazzfishI just realised it's been awhile since I've noted anything here.
Mostly that's because I don't know how to track revision. When I'm writing something new it's easy: "500 words today" or whatever. Revising... I can work on a story for three hours and have no measurable change. I dunno.
In January (well, spilling over into the first three days of February) I revised the space story, whose title will continue to be "One Only" until I come up with a better one. I took it back to CVS on the 3rd and got it critiqued on the 10th. That mostly went well: fixing some of the problems exposed new ones, like it does, and some of the old problems weren't quite fixed yet.
It's got two viewpoint characters, alternating. I wondered, on the first draft, whether I ought to scrap one of the viewpoint characters. Everyone said "no," and in fact the other character needed to have a stronger voice. So one of the things I did in the rewrite was to get more into her head. Now that she's strong enough to carry the story, chopping out that other viewpoint may be the thing to do after all. Argh.
And the story is still not doing enough of what I want it to be doing, and I don't know how to make it do those things. I don't think I'll learn that by continuing trying to fix this story, either. I think I need to try another story, and incorporate some of what I've learned into that.
This one is, however, Just About Good Enough for my purposes. ("There's a lot there to work with" and "It's better than some published stories I've seen" were two of the comments.) So I shall spend the next couple of weeks cleaning it up and ship it off to Viable Paradise, along with a $25 check and a cover letter "describing [my] background and [my] reasons for wishing to attend the workshop" (argh).
Last weekend I got hooked on a computer game. (Game deliberately not identified because it's not relevant. I'll be writing more about it specifically in a different post later.)
I hate that.
No, seriously. I spent Sunday evening thinking, "I want to put this down and do some revising, because I want to deal with that while the commentary's fresh in my mind and get it done before the end of the month." And I kept loading up the stupid game instead. Same thing happened on Monday.
Don't get me wrong: it's a fun game. I enjoy it while I'm playing it and I even like thinking about it at random moments. I also get headachey, and cranky at myself for not having done anything useful even though I actually /want/ to for once.
Tuesday I tried a new tack: come home from work and be brainless until dinner. Game, internet, reading, whatever. Then, after dinner, do some writing.
That worked remarkably well. I think I squeezed in one more quick game before I actually started writing, and then I spent several hours cleaning up the first third of the story. And it felt /good/. Even the parts that were horrible and frustrating and "this is not doing what i want it to be doing" and "i am not nearly good enough to pull this off" and "this makes no sense at all" had the exhilaration of wrestling with a tough problem.
I like the part where I'm writing and it feels like the right thing to be doing.
Mostly that's because I don't know how to track revision. When I'm writing something new it's easy: "500 words today" or whatever. Revising... I can work on a story for three hours and have no measurable change. I dunno.
In January (well, spilling over into the first three days of February) I revised the space story, whose title will continue to be "One Only" until I come up with a better one. I took it back to CVS on the 3rd and got it critiqued on the 10th. That mostly went well: fixing some of the problems exposed new ones, like it does, and some of the old problems weren't quite fixed yet.
It's got two viewpoint characters, alternating. I wondered, on the first draft, whether I ought to scrap one of the viewpoint characters. Everyone said "no," and in fact the other character needed to have a stronger voice. So one of the things I did in the rewrite was to get more into her head. Now that she's strong enough to carry the story, chopping out that other viewpoint may be the thing to do after all. Argh.
And the story is still not doing enough of what I want it to be doing, and I don't know how to make it do those things. I don't think I'll learn that by continuing trying to fix this story, either. I think I need to try another story, and incorporate some of what I've learned into that.
This one is, however, Just About Good Enough for my purposes. ("There's a lot there to work with" and "It's better than some published stories I've seen" were two of the comments.) So I shall spend the next couple of weeks cleaning it up and ship it off to Viable Paradise, along with a $25 check and a cover letter "describing [my] background and [my] reasons for wishing to attend the workshop" (argh).
Last weekend I got hooked on a computer game. (Game deliberately not identified because it's not relevant. I'll be writing more about it specifically in a different post later.)
I hate that.
No, seriously. I spent Sunday evening thinking, "I want to put this down and do some revising, because I want to deal with that while the commentary's fresh in my mind and get it done before the end of the month." And I kept loading up the stupid game instead. Same thing happened on Monday.
Don't get me wrong: it's a fun game. I enjoy it while I'm playing it and I even like thinking about it at random moments. I also get headachey, and cranky at myself for not having done anything useful even though I actually /want/ to for once.
Tuesday I tried a new tack: come home from work and be brainless until dinner. Game, internet, reading, whatever. Then, after dinner, do some writing.
That worked remarkably well. I think I squeezed in one more quick game before I actually started writing, and then I spent several hours cleaning up the first third of the story. And it felt /good/. Even the parts that were horrible and frustrating and "this is not doing what i want it to be doing" and "i am not nearly good enough to pull this off" and "this makes no sense at all" had the exhilaration of wrestling with a tough problem.
I like the part where I'm writing and it feels like the right thing to be doing.
no subject
Date: 2011-02-17 10:33 pm (UTC)I have this problem too. I dislike revision (a lot) and this is part of the reason why. I know people who will make a list of different issues to fix on a pass-through, so maybe that's a way of measuring it? Like, okay, I fixed the structural problems today, and tomorrow I'll go through and enliven the characters. So maybe that's one way to do it? I usually look at it on a page-by-page basis, since I revised of a hardcopy (I put big checks on a page as I revise them). Buf if you're doing major changes, that may not work, either.
I think I need to try another story, and incorporate some of what I've learned into that.
That's the best way to learn to write (imho). But like I said, I'm not the biggest revision fan in the world (it doesn't give me the thrill that drafting does), so I could be biased.
Good luck with VIable Paradise!
no subject
Date: 2011-02-18 05:57 pm (UTC)I mean, Tuesday night I basically rewrote from scratch the entire first scene-- and it needed it, because it needed to be doing about three different things and wasn't doing any of them, but that doesn't lend itself well to finishing any /one/ thing.
Which is one of the reasons I'm really hoping I get into VP: maybe they can teach me how to revise.
And, yeah. I figure, I can keep attacking the rough edges of this one story and make it As Good As Possible, and then I'll end up with... one story. Or I can write a bunch more stories, and revise them somewhat, and in a year or two I'll have a batch of stories and have a better idea of how I can fix them.
Thanks! I really don't know how much to hope or anything. Even college applications weren't this bad: I applied early decision to Tech and was basically guaranteed admittance based on my high school and my over-3.0 GPA.