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Finished First Draft, when to edit?



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Thu Jul 25, 2013 5:37 pm
RebeccaZeno says...



I just finished my first draft a few days ago and now I'm obsessed with going through my draft and editing, but most people say when you finish the first draft you should take a break.

What are your thoughts/opinions?
"Don't give up after you've put your effort into trying"
"If you love someone, put their name in a circle; because hearts can be broken, but circles never end." Karen Amanda Hooper, Grasping At Eternity
  





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Thu Jul 25, 2013 6:50 pm
Rosendorn says...



You should most certainly take a break after writing a draft. At least a month if not more.

See, a phenomenon when it comes to editing right after you've written is that you read from your short term memory. You don't actually read what's on the page— you read what you thought you'd put on the page. So everything sounds better because you're reading from your head instead of the words themselves.

Micro-editing aside (the grammar use), taking a break lets you distance yourself from the story. When you finish you likely think it's better than it actually is, or far worse than it actually is. This is not a good editing frame of mine. It might mean you see more plot holes than there are, cut more than you need to, or keep stuff that really needs to go.

This break lets you breathe and lets the story breathe. Once you're no longer in the huge rush of writing and editing it, you can:

1- See the story more honestly, for good or ill
2- Accept criticism from your beta readers better
3- Think about other things besides your story (good for getting back into a generally creative state of mind, because draft 2 could mean rewriting)
4- Read the story better because you're not reading from short term memory.

One thing to keep in mind is a first draft is going to be pretty bad. Maybe not completely illegibly horrible, but at the very least there are going to be points when the story falls apart on you. I have yet to read any first draft that doesn't hit that point. It might not fall apart till you have five thousand words left, but it will fall apart. And you need to take a break to be able to see that part.

Breaks are one of those things that seem really counterproductive because you want to stay in the rush of writing, but staying in that rush can actually be fairly detrimental to your writing progress.

Because good writers need to know both when to keep going, and when to let go.
A writer is a world trapped in a person— Victor Hugo

Ink is blood. Paper is bandages. The wounded press books to their heart to know they're not alone.
  








By the sweat of your brow you will eat your food until you return to the ground, since from it you were taken; for dust you are and to dust you will return.
— Genesis 3:19