The issue of the re-write

20 Oct 2010

Okay - this is something that has bugged me for awhile now and it's time I finally addressed it.

At what point should you - if ever - decide to embark on a wholesale re-write of something you're done with?

Looking back over the myriad of things I've written over the years I can see where I've recycled ideas a few times into better versions of them but I've always tried to stay away from simply re-writing something for the sake of it. I've looked at some of my older stuff - produced over 5-10 years ago - and I've contemplated running my eye over it again to see how I could improve it now...yet something about that feels wrong; I'd finished the story, I'd moved on from there and I hadn't ventured back to it due to the fact I knew the tale was done and dusted.

And yet there's this niggling little itch that screams at me to go over it again...

Is this just a quirk that I appear to have or does everyone else "suffer" with the same urge?

20 Oct 2010

I have never done a re-write, even though there is much of my writing that would probably benefit from it.

With my longer pieces, I do like to take a break from the story and leave it alone for a few weeks (or months) at a time so that I can re-read it with fresh eyes and look at it from a more critical angle.

Unfortunately if I don't like what I've written, I usually just abandon the entire thing rather than re-write.

I might get around to it one day, but there always seems to be new ideas I'd rather concentrate my efforts on before going back to clean up the rest.

*** Click Here to Read Chapter One

26 Oct 2010

I considered doing a rewrite of a novel I wrote about ten years ago, but after skimming through it, it just seems like it'd be too much work...almost like having to rework the whole thing. I feel like my time would be better spent calling that a learning experience and moving on, using the knowledge I've gained since then to start something new.