Delete
June 1st, 2010
I’ve been staring into the abyss of draft one of the novel—and it’s been staring right back at me (thx, Nietzsche!). I’m losing the staring contest.
One of the most brutal truths of writing is: sometimes you have to throw away every word you’ve spent days/weeks/months stringing together.
I am really bad at this. Some writers have an instinctual peace with this when it happens. They don’t necessarily like it, but have come to terms with the fact that tossing out a lot of work is part of the work.
I’m not one of those writers. Tossing away drafts makes me very uncomfortable.
I wind up going into contortions or having pointless, week-long staring contests with the draft rather than admit that it’s an unsalvageable piece of garbage. I mean, I eventually get there, but then I have another week where I essentially wail and moan about it before I can clear the decks and start again.
And now, it’s time I look away, hit new–>open and start all over again. The novel draft has fundamental problems that can’t be rooted out and fixed with fancy developmental editing. The world has gaping holes and the plot—well, there isn’t much of a plot.
And again, in the end, what I thought was going to interest me about the world of the novel and the characters wound up not being what interested me at all. This other thing, which is, at best, a small mention in the current draft, is the key and the pivot point—and what I think would make this novel worth reading. So, it’s back to some research and then drafting and word count and the beginning.
So, yeah. There goes ~75,000 words, *poof*. And I’m back where I started. A blank page and the irrational itch to tell a captivating story, the fear that I’m not big enough to tell a captivating story and the boundless hope that drives me onward—which can’t be quantified or understood.
OK, Blink.