Photo by Lori Ann http://mamawit.wordpress.com/
I’ve just read a post on Holly Lisle’s Talysmana site regarding first drafts and the writing process, which has sparked off a few thoughts of my own.
One of the hardest things in writing, or learning to write, is learning to accept that what comes out of your imagination, your pen or your keyboard first time round isn’t necessarily anything remotely like what it will be when you decide it’s finished.
You have to push on through the muddles, accept the changes in direction and bear the confusion with stoic determination. You have to trust that the changes you make to a first draft are going to result in a better story.
And it’s not cheating when you change the beginning to match the ending. It’s okay to rewrite whole sections, delete others, change character names, swap locations, switch themes or whatever else occurs to you as you’re writing.
I’ve been a creative writing tutor for a few years now. I use the word ‘cheating’ deliberately, because so often I’ve had students cast me scandalised glances when I tell them it is perfectly okay to go back and add a few lines in chapter two when they think of a cool twist in chapter 15 that needs some foreshadowing. It really is as though I’ve suggested they cheat during an important exam.
First drafts are meant to be torn apart. Stories grow in much the same way as patchwork quilts. You have a load of little bits and pieces of material (in stories called scenes or ideas) and as you assemble the finished piece you rearrange, discard, add, match colours and shades, experiment with stitch styles and thread colours (in stories called narrative voices) and finally find a combination of all the above that pleases you.
You have to go through the experimentation and shuffling, the mixing and matching, the discards and the additions. There’s no other way to do it. If you don’t try the pink floral up against the purple stripes you might miss a wonderful and startling combination that delights and surprises.
It’s not cheating to shuffle the pieces around to work out which looks best.
But here’s the thing. In order to have pieces to shuffle about, you’ve got to write them first. Only then can you start the final assembly process that builds a story. And that’s what’s so hard about first drafts. It’s too easy to fall into the trap of believing that because it’s written, it’s got to stay as it is.
Wrong. It’s just another piece of the patchwork. If it clashes then change, revise, rewrite or delete it.
That’s what first drafts are for.
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