Class 12 - Editing, and assignment briefing

Today’s Session

Today, I’m going to set your first assignment. So I thought it would also be good to talk more about editing. Because the secret is great writing is editing.

On Editing

Several years ago, I wrote a children’s book (called The Snorgh and the Sailor: it’s my only picture book, but it is still in print). The book had 600 words. But it was the most intensive editing I have ever done. I spent hours with my editor arguing over every word. It was a long and difficult process, and I think I must have edited it about 30 times, some of these times taking hours or even days. But when you are writing something so small, you have to get every single word right.

The temptation when writing is to always move on to the next thing. But editing allows you to make your words sing, to communicate precisely what you want to communicate. And the best editing is an intensely creative activity. So we’re going to explore this today.

Editing is about taking your writing, and making it better. As you edit, you may have all kinds of ideas in our heads about good writing. Some of these ideas are helpful, and some are not, so let’s get some of these ideas out into the open.

Klinkenborg: The Noises in Our Heads

The writer Verlyn Klinkenborg teaches at Yale University. His book, Several Short Sentences About Writing (2013) is a superb guide not only to the art of writing, but also to the art of learning to trust your instincts and develop your own voice. Klinkenborg argues that when you sit down to write, there is often a lot of “noise in your head” that gets in the way of what you want to say.

Here’s the extract. Let’s read it together out loud.

Here’s an experiment: Pay attention to all the noise in your head as you go about writing.

Much of it is what you already know about writing, which includes: The voices of former teachers, usually uttering rules.

Rules like, “Don’t begin sentences with ‘and.’ ”

(It’s okay. You can begin sentences with “and.”)

The things everybody knows or assumes about writers and how they work, Whether they’re true or not.

The things you feel you must or mustn’t do, without really knowing why. The things that make you wonder, “Am I allowed to …?”

(Yes, you’re allowed to. Not forever and always, but until you decide for yourself what works and what doesn’t.)

Write these things down—the contents of the noise in your head as you write. You can’t revise or discard what you don’t consciously recognize.

These assumptions and prohibitions and obligations are the imprint of your education and the culture you live in. Distrust them.

This noise is made up of things that have been told about writing, or things that everybody assumes to be true about writing.

Klinkenborg’s advice about what to do with all this noise is that you should first externalise it. You should make explicit all these internalised ideas you have about writing. Then you should provisionally distrust it. Maybe some of this is good advice. Maybe some of it isn’t. But, until you’ve had a chance to think through it, this noise gets in the way of developing your own voice as a writer. It gets in the way of you writing with the same naturalness with which you speak.

In this exercise, do as Klinkenborg suggests. Write down all the noise in your head, all the ideas about what makes writing good that crowd into your head as you write.

Make a list of all those things your teachers told you, or those rules that you think must be followed, or the other rules that you don’t understand but nevertheless feel oppressed by.

Then we’ll put you into breakout groups to discuss what you have written. We’ll then discuss in the main group.

(After the class, as a small purification ritual (if you like) you can go through your list, and strike through all the rules that make you feel bad. Then you can go and have a cup of tea!).

Assignment Briefing: An Extended Memoir

We’ll come back to editing, but now I want to set your assignment briefing. By now, you should have enough experience to try your hand at a longer memoir piece. The second assignment is to write a single piece of sustained memoir-writing, 1000-1500 words**, on any topic of your choosing.

Your memoir piece must be in the first person (largely), and it must be nonfiction (entirely).

You’ll need to think hard about selecting your materials (you are not writing your entire life story, but just a single, coherent piece, or series of pieces, of memoir). For this, you can substantially redevelop a piece you have started for another assignment. Or you can submit something entirely new. If you are redeveloping an earlier piece, you will be expected to radically revise, edit and expand. If it is a new piece, you will be expected to write a polished and repeatedly edited piece.

Think about everything we have covered, talking about voice and persona, the importance of building a rich and layered world, clarity, and — above all — having a story that you want to tell.

The deadline for this piece is the end of 20th August, ICT.

Submit your final piece in doc or docx format on canvas. Submit in double-spaced format, 11 or 12 pt size, using Times New Roman.

Rubric: You will be graded on logic, clarity, concreteness, storytelling and creativity.

As this is creative writing. You should not use academic referencing. If you quote books, then think about how you can do this elegantly within your storytelling.

Thinking through the rubric

The rubric for this assignment is really just a template for editing. It sets out five areas of focus. Think of these as general questions to ask not just about the piece as a whole, but about every single sentence.

1. Logic: What is happening? Do we know where, who, what, when, how and why?
2. Clarity: Are the sentences — each one of them — saying something precise and clear? Does this need to be said? Does each sentence follow from the last sentence, and lead to the next one? If not, is this okay?
3. Concreteness: Are you being specific? Are you talking about concrete details? Can the reader picture in their mind what you are picturing in your mind? Are you avoiding falling into vagueness and abstraction? Are you relying on clichés?
4. Storytelling: Do you have a story to tell? Are you aware of your audience? Are you drawing them in? Is what you are saying relevant to the story?
5. Creativity: Are you taking creative risks? Are you experimenting in your work?

What story do I want to tell?

I’ll put you into breakout groups to talk about this! We’ll have time to check in at the end, and explore any questions.

Good luck!