The Art Of The Rewrite

COLUMN BY JON GINGERICH DECEMBER 7, 2011

So youve written your story, mulled over its potential problems, and even had it critiqued by friends or colleagues whove
given you their praise, suggestions and ultimate diagnoses. You know your work has major issues that need addressed.
Now what?

The first draft is going to be bad. Thats okay. The inexperienced writer works on an idea, discovers its not working and
gives up. The experienced writer works on an idea, discovers its not working but has the faith in the story and
him/herself to keep going, because he/she knows it will get better with time. Contrary to many beginners opinions,
stories arent truly born in the first draft, but through numerous, significant rewrites. While revision may lack the
immediate romanticism of an initial draft, rewriting is a vital part of the creative process. Rewriting is an art form unto
itself; just as much discovery is involved in the process, and it can be just as inspiring and inventive as the first draft. Any
time you alter your storys vital elements it teases your creative side to come up with new ideas. Rewriting can help your
story become aware of itself; it can elevate an idea to its own reality. In order for the process to work however, a true
rewrite cannot simply be editing, copy-editing or proofing. I know you've worked hard on it, but your first draft should be
viewed as nothing more than a framework. A true rewrite is surrender; it is a complete re-imagining of the work, usually
more difficult and always more time consuming than the initial draft.

In order to produce a compelling, well-written work of fiction, the writer must wear the hats of writer, editor and audience
simultaneously. This is more than a difficult task its a practically impossible undertaking. The writer is expected juggle
the work, how she/he plans to change it and most importantly theories of how your imagined readership will
interpret what's been written. Its like putting on a pair of glasses with three lenses and being asked to navigate a dark
highway. The only way to rewrite successfully is to look through each lens separately and attack all elements of the story
comprehensively. There are many ways to view a story, but when it comes to the task of rewriting Ill suggest we divide
stories into two distinct views a Macro and Micro view and adopt an approach that addresses each. The Macro
view is your works overarching intent. Its where you establish a storys theme, shape, scenes and structure. Its where
you discover what your story is about, and who your characters are. Micro is the details: its language, length, style, and
grammar, its the sum feeling your Macro qualities exemplify over the body of the work. In some ways, both offer
different views of the same components: Structure is Macro, prose is Micro. Character is Macro, dialogue is Micro.
Theme is Macro, imagery is Micro. Macro is a discovery process, Micro is a polishing process. Macro is where you lay
the foundation for your story, Micro is where you make the house presentable.

Too many writers confuse these distinct disciplines and tackle one before the other is addressed. They tweak and
retweak sentences while ignoring structural problems, and the result is a bad story thats well-written, a piece of work
thats grammatically correct yet uninspired. Its the equivalent of shopping for decorative window shutters when the
foundation of your house sits on a fault line. The below four steps will hopefully help divide the tasks of rewriting into an
undertaking thats both reasonable and comprehensive. The idea is to move your rewriting focus gradually from a Macro
process to a Micro one, ensuring each area of your story is given due attention from the foundation up.

Restructuring
One of the best tools a writer has is time. After youve finished writing your first draft and had it workshopped or critiqued,
step away from it. Give yourself distance, work on something else. When you return to your draft with a fresh eye youll
be about as objective as any creator can hope for. Then look at it a printed copy, not a computer screen and ask
what structural problems need to be addressed. Whats your storys theme what are you trying to say, and are you
saying anything at all? Whats the story about (the litmus test is you should be able to tell someone in a single sentence,
with a verb) and does it echo throughout the piece? How vivid is the world youve created? Remove scenes and
characters that dont adequately resonate this theme; add subplots, foreshadowing and new characters that strengthen
it. For the characters that remain, who are they and what do they want? Do they speak and behave with authority? Can
any of them be criticized as clichs, or do they avoid easy characterization? Youll need to walk in their shoes, discover
their histories, their upbringings. Is the point-of-view a correct one, does the voice reflect the internal structure of the
story? Does the plot make sense? It should reveal itself not in a heavy-handed manner but through a slow unfolding of
character, structure and theme.

The restructuring process should be concerned entirely with Macro qualities. This means it concerns itself less with
actual writing and more with building. Leave grammar and sentences alone for the time being; right now youre molding
your story for meaning. Physically take a red pen to the scenes and characters that arent working. Cross things out,
write in the margins. Then write your new scenes and characters in a new document. When youre finished, paste the
new scenes into the old document, and delete the old ones. Youll notice the shape of the story and the behavior of
characters will change as they begin to move around and interact with new elements.

Revision
The operative word here is vision. After more time has passed, print out your second draft and look at it again. Here
youll hopefully see the literary forest for the trees, how your ideas are linking together. Make sure the storys proportions
and rhythms are even. Is the story revealing itself through action and dialogue instead of summary or a laundry list of
descriptive details? Is your central theme resonating throughout but subtle enough to avoid being overbearing? The
readers participation makes the story. Is the beginning of the story inviting? Is the ending profound? How can you
maximize emotional intensity in the plot? Add complexity to your characters. Add details that flesh out who a character is;
add quirks that redefine them as authentic individuals instead of types. In what ways do they contract themselves?
Pepper characters with subtle details that resonate on a subconscious level. Do they have distinct ways of speaking, do
they repeat specific phrases or words that are specific to them? Is the overall dialogue informative but genuine?

Notice with this step were moving from a view that began as Macro and is growing increasingly Micro. Were mowing
down, whittling from an abstract lump into a specific shape. The revision process is concerned with building the
relationships of form, style and meaning. Here your story is gradually accruing metaphorical weight. What impact does
your writing style have on the story? Language should absorb the theme of the work so youll want to manipulate
language to match the material, but not in an overbearing way. Again, print out your work for this process, and do your
edits in longhand.

Copy editing
Were now fully at the Micro end of the process. Print out your second draft and set it on your desk (ideally, in an upright
copy holder). Looking at your document, and with your second draft now closed and, ideally, deleted open a new
document and retype the whole thing over again. The idea is to push the document through a filtration process that
focuses on language. When youre forced to confront every sentence, youll be amazed at all the stuff that can go. This is
where youll see if your words are linking together. First, make sure the words inform, if the theme takes residence in the
syntax. Look at how your paragraphs transition; transitions should be subtle evolutions of an idea. How does one
paragraph relate to the next? Look at how your sentences grow and branch within the paragraphs. Does every sentence
sound like an organic component of the voice, almost like its writer invented it?

In the copy editing process, were looking for the two es: whats exceptional and whats essential. Get rid of anything
thats not the latter. Delete incidental details. Cut redundancies. Listen to the acoustic properties your sentences have.
Have you varied your sentence lengths, or are you delivering the same rhythms over and over again? Make sure your
sentences are active. Look out for figurative clich, unnecessary modifiers and anything that unnecessarily pads the
sentence. Cut until it hurts; challenge yourself to omit as many words as you can while retaining the sentences intended
meaning. Ask yourself: how would a first-time reader approach this sentence, this word? The editing process should not
water down, the editing process should refine. If youre still confused as to what your story is about youll need to stop
and return to the first step before proceeding.

Proofreading and line editing

You should do this only after the first three steps have been accomplished, before youre sending the story out for
possible publication. Read your story for grammar, double-check your sentences. Watch for punctuation, which gives
your readers space to breathe between ideas. Then, paginate your work into columns, using a program like InDesign or
QuarkXPress. Change the font from the one in which you usually write. Sometimes the strange look of a different
typeface and layout can reveal new problems to eyes already tired from the work. Finally, read your work aloud.
Speaking puts your work in audible spaces; it objectifies the language and places it outside the writers head. Both of
these methods are intended to temporarily trick the brain into seeing your work in a new light, to imagine your story
from the perspective of a stranger.

Youll notice I prefer an editing environment thats as analogue as possible. Theres no doubt the medium you choose to
transcribe ideas (computer, typewriter, shorthand) irrevocably affects the written product. Computers are great, but
theyre machines of convenience; we live in an age where technologies allow us to circumvent essential parts of the
editing process. You can be assured that when someone wrote a 500-page novel with a quill pen only the essentials
remained. Computers, while enabling us to churn out rough drafts at incredibly short intervals, have given writers
diarrhea of the mind. They've allowed a lot of unneeded superlatives and afterthoughts to pass through the filtration
process. Moreover, by virtue of their design theyre constantly tempting us to scroll up and change what weve written
before moving on, so the finished product is often a messy hodgepodge of polished crap aside half-baked brilliance. Im
not suggesting writers change the transcribing medium theyre accustomed to. Instead, my advice is to use the best of
both worlds to your advantage: use a computer to write your first drafts quickly, so you can trowel the compost of your
creative mind with abandon. Let it be sloppy, let it be messy. The rewrite however, should ideally take ten times the effort
to complete. When switching cerebral lobes to your analytical side, switch mediums a red pen, paper to
accommodate the new mental task at hand. Always type a new draft; do your work in a new document, not an existing
one; and dont keep multiple drafts. When you force yourself into a position where every word matters, youll be amazed
at the effect it will have on your final product. Ideally, the rewriting process should be like wringing out a towel, where we
void the bad elements and add new ones that contribute to its ideal shape. Have one draft, and work it to death.