Editing your first draft before you finished it? Pros and cons?

For me, I do enjoy showing some people pieces of it to get broad feedback. I don't, however , edit a thing while I'm writing. I know that the only thing keeping me writing is that I'm allowed to write crap the first go around. If I started editing and read over it and it was still crap, I'd get so discouraged. So my advice is bury that editor until it's time.

I tend to do some editing during the first draft stage, but I try to keep it to a minimum. If it's something that drastically affects the rest of the story (like I have to change a plot point), then I'll definitely go back and deal with it. But if it's something like wonky POV or word choice, I just make notes at that point in CAPS or in highlighted text so I remember what I wanted to change.

Mostly, I try to suppress any editing that derails my forward progress. (I really like Anne Lamott's advice about "sh!tty first drafts" in BIRD BY BIRD.)

But then again, I find that if I'm having trouble getting in the writing mood, sometimes it helps to look over what I've written to get that momentum back. And while I'm re-reading, I'm bound to do some editing and mental revision.

Oh, and keep in mind--lots of writers do a complete sh!tty first draft and then go through multiple complete revisions of their manuscript--sometime changing/deleting/moving whole chapters, characters, events, etc. Whether you do it at the end or do it as you go is really based on what works for you.

When I write a first draft, I might edit if I notice a blaring mistake out of the corner of my eye. Otherwise, once I start editing instead of moving forward, I can't stop and it would take me eons to finish the whole draft.

I know next time I write I am going to write my crappy first draft and then work on revisions. I was so inefficient when I was writing my first draft. I would re-read everything I'd written the day before and spend most of my time revising.

While my first draft may have been a little better quality in the end it took forever to finish because of the editing that I did along the way(And it still needed a lot of editing afterward). It's personal preference, but that's my experience.

The big con, of course, is that by spending your time editing you will not finish the writing. But if re-working the beginning will change what you write to finish, then it might be worth doing it.

But even if I did have to change something in the beginning, I wouldn't do a line by line edit. Fix concepts or plot points but don't try to perfect grammar and style. Those need to wait for the whole book to be finished or you're just wastin' time.

Pro1: you might change things that will affect downstream plot events or character development, so go ahead and fix the beginning now so that what you write after page 350 will be what you really want in there.

Pro2: going back now and editing out excess words/whatever recurring problems you can see now that you are prone to may help you learn to not put them in as you draft the rest.

Con: There is a risk you'll become one of those people who gets caught in an endless editing loop on one novel and eventually dies of old age changing "leap" to "jump" back to "leap" (and so on) on page 85 of Novel #1.

Additionally: I don't know where you are in your writing career. If you are unpublished and this is your first novel, the chances of it selling are remote--sorry if I'm the first to break the awful news, but it's true for 99.99% of writers. Most people need to write a few bad novels before they can write a good one. If that's the case, all the writing you're doing right now is still apprenticeship writing, and it doesn't matter much which way you go as long as your choice doesn't block you or create some lifelong bad habit you'll come to regret. The thing to do is continue serving the apprenticeship in whatever way (new writing, editing, it's all good, it's all teaching you things you'll need to know) works for you.

I never do this, but I know several people who start their writing sessions off by editing, and it seems to work swell for them. Personally, I've found that my ''editor mode'' and ''writing mode'' is so drastically different that it's more productive to not mix the two. If I realize I need to change, add, or remove something, I make a note of it and move on. Some other cons:

> You're not looking at the MS with a fresh pair of eyes, and therefore might be less likely to see errors.
>As already mentioned, endless editing loop. Editing is pretty much a trap... I remember someone posted forever ago about how it took them months to get back on track.
>If you're not finished, and have already decided to change it once, there's a decent chance you'll decide to finish it again.
>You end up stalling yourself because you'd rather edit. (This happens to me if I edit as well).

Write it, then edit it because if you edit before writing it, you'll never finish it.

I've been writing and editing professionally for 10 years. All technical stuff, nonfiction, and marketing, though. But the way I write seems to be pretty much the same no matter what the topic.

If I know there are problems at the beginning of a piece, I can't/don't move forward. I'm not talking about little things like just being unsatisfied with a bit of dialogue. But if in Chapter 8, I realize that I've painted myself into a corner or that I need a character to do something different, and it reverberates back to Chapter 2, then I have to stop and fix everything from Chapter 2 to Chapter 8.

If I were better about just moving forward, I'd have been done with the first draft of the novel weeks ago. But personally, I'm okay with where I'm at.

I asked a similar question. You can check out the thread here. I got a lot of really good feedback that ended up being for naught. Advice: don't take up other projects (beta editing in my case) while you've got a WIP unless you're sure you can multitask!

SirTimberWolf said:

Hey there,

I'm working on a rather large piece of fiction and I've been posting it as I work on it, however I've had my attention brought to a number of errors. Mostly those that're going to require a re-write of the material. So I'm considering going back to the first few chapters to make them flow better, but I'm not sure if I can handle writing 3000+ words a day and then going back to earlier chapters and editing.

To give you an idea, I just crossed 80 thousand words (woohoo) and I'm roughly half way through where I want to be. Editing, of course, will cut that down quite a bit.

None the less, I'd love to hear thoughts from people who work this way. Is it worth doing or should I just come back to it with fresh eyes 'when it's done'?

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If you've gotten this far without stopping to edit, don't change the routine now. Finish it, and then go back and rewrite it.

I revise as I go from the first sentence. But for me, revision and editing are not separate from the so-called "creative" phase. In fact, revision is where the real creativity happens. The first words down on the page are, for the most part, nothing more than raw material, out of which I build the story.

I would also suggest you finish, keeping doing exactly what you have been doing. In my experience editing the beginning when you are somewhere in the middle is a good way to get stuck editing without finishing. Another possibility is you change the beginning, putting a lot of time into that, and then by the time you get to the end you realize you need to change the beginning once again.

SirTimberWolf said:

I'm working on a rather large piece of fiction and I've been posting it as I work on it, however I've had my attention brought to a number of errors.

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That's the Procrastination Demon at work. Fight the Procrastination Demon or she'll make you stop completely.

Yes, I do edit as I go, but only when I sit down to write and reviewing yesterday's product. But I don't do it as much as before.

Beside the keyboard, I keep an up to date printout of the story. I mark ideas, edits and changes there, so that at the end I can use this info to guide the first rewrite.

What works best for me is editing as I go.

Pro: I end up with very clean copy when I'm done.

Pro: The story is already there. It may need tweaking, but I've got down everything I want to put down.

Pro: When I edit as I go, I usually edit the stuff I wrote the night before, then proceed. This cuts down on continuity errors later on. It also gets me in a writing mood.

Pro: I don't feel as overwhelmed when I come to the end and face the prospect of editing. It still needs editing, but the major things have been taken care of.

Con: It can lead to procrastination. I think I would write slowly no matter what, so this depends on the writer.

Con: You'll probably have to edit later anyway. Yes, but you'll probably have less to do.

It's how I like to operate. It might not be the best for everyone.

I wonder if editing before and editing after the work is done is essentially the same.

I beginning to see it as though one spends essentially the same amount of time whether they edit before they finish or after they finish. Anyone else get this feeling?

I always edit as I go, and I find it much faster than trying to repair an entire lousy first draft.

This question really is writer dependent. Many writers, good and famous, edit as they go, while other seem incapable of working this way.

Go over to Dean Koontz's website and listen to some of his podcasts on writing. He edits each page numerous times, and only when he gets it right does he move on to the next page. He's also incredibly prolific.

I write the same way, and it's always worked for me.

It may work for you, or it may not, but never listen to anyone who says you can't work this way, or that it will automatically take a long time to finish a novel this way.

The best way to learn which methods work overall isn't to listen to me or anyone else, it's to look around and see how pro writers actually work. If you find pro writers who do something you want to try, then try it, regardless of doomsayers. Real writers actually doing something always trumps opinion.

When a method of writing is nagging you, give it a try. The worst that can't happen is that it won't work for you, and you'll have to go back to plan B.

DanielaTorre said:

I wonder if editing before and editing after the work is done is essentially the same.

I beginning to see it as though one spends essentially the same amount of time whether they edit before they finish or after they finish. Anyone else get this feeling?

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The two are certainly not the same for me. Editing as I go is very fast. If I wait until a draft is finished, editing turns into rewriting and revising. That's very, very slow.

M.Macabre said:

I know several people who start their writing sessions off by editing, and it seems to work swell for them.

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This is my method. I always begin a writing session by going back and reading at least the last chapter--and editing it--before beginning a new one. After a brief read/edit, I jot down a basic outline of the next chapter.

Just because I edit on the fly doesn't mean there's no editing to do when the story ends, though. There is, but not as much as there would be otherwise.

By nature, I am very methodical--I have lots of lists during the creative process--so editing as I write works for me. I get jittery thinking about just sitting down and writing an entire manuscript without making corrections along the way.

I always edit/revise as I go, and I always (exception: once) finish the project. When I finish, there's no "OMG I've got umpteen thousand words to go through again!" or "OMG there's that huge plot hole in the third chapter that changes everything!". Plus I'm not bored silly after the second, third, or fortieth draft.

If you're a perfectionist, editing/revising is going to be a time sucking monster no matter when you do it. You have to discipline yourself to stop already and get on with the rest of it.

But, as with every single solitary method of writing - you have to do whatever works for you and that particular story. And, like James mentioned, if someone tells you you can't do it this way or that way, it only means they can't.

I am writing my first novel, so my 2 cents may not be worth even 2 cents.

When I am writing, I tend to write scenes. I have a sense where the scenes will fit. However, sometimes a scene moves to another part of the overall story. I have re-written some scenes that were sketchy or incomplete. Some times I've re-written a scene a couple times.

Am I sure it's the best way? No. In fact, I am not sure where this whole story idea is going to lead. I simply continue to write when I have ideas to write, re-write and edit when I have no real ideas, and research in order to get into a new scene.

Jeff

This may sound like a cop-out, but do what works for you.

If you can edit as you go along, that's great. That's one less step to worry about and you can get to the submission stage that much quicker.

If you're one of those types who is constantly tinkering with the story and not writing anything new, then you end up never finishing it. That was me. I always ended up stuck at chapter 4. Sure, I'd have 4 perfect chapters, but I never got beyond that until I turned off the editor and just wrote until I hit "the end."

I won't edit till the novel is finished. But what I will do is I will add a note like, "make it that so and so does this" or "reword this later," so when I'm editing I know what's up.

You need to be out of your heard for the first draft. Allow the page to be full of adverbs and showing vs telling errors if it allows you to be free. This is when the good stuff comes out.

I just can't do the editing while still drafting thing. It seems to "set" the edited bits too much, make them too permanent. A bit like varnishing parts of an oil painting while still working on other bits of the canvas.

I prefer the whole story to still be in flux in that draft, so if I do suddenly get a great idea for a new way to take it, that happens to contradict earlier bits, I'm happy to just go ahead and write as if those bits were already different, and make a note to change them later. If I've spent time editing I feel more married to the earlier parts, that if I do something that means I have to go and change them again that I wasted my time by editing them in the first place.

It also seems to contradict the advice to get some distance from what you've written before editing it, so you can have a more objective point of view. I find that very useful, even essential. And if I was going back and editing prose I only wrote the day before I wouldn't have that emotional distance.

I'll stick with my straight through drafts, then editing. I've tried it both ways and that's the one that works best for me.