only temporary satisfied

Ever work on something old to realize the more work you do, the more work something needs? I've got a short story that I thought was done. Then I thought I made it a lot better through editing and revision. Now, I look at it again and think it sort of needs a major overall to get even better. And, of course, I don't want to stop fixing this story until it's right. I feel like I've got to give this story what it needs. And that right now is more revision. And maybe even more after that. Sometimes it's hard to make a piece shine and sparkle the way I want it to.

It's a frustrating process because I only seem to feel satisfied temporarily. I've been through this process with a lot of my writing. Can anyone relate?

 

I guess I don't move on because I find myself in this position quite often. And to achieve the results I want this is part of the process. Grrrr...

Personally, I've never made something worse by editing and revising it. But that might just be me and the way I work. It just makes everything harder than I want it to be or I think it should be.

 

Sometimes the worst part of revision is knowing what needs to be done.

 

Yes. I went through this with every story I wrote that was more than a few thousand words. It’s one of many reasons I know I’m not a novelist.

By contrast, there are poems where I’ve had to write 2 or 3 iterations before finally getting the right version, but I finally did, even if I went months between attempts.

 

Ah.. Don't be so quick to dismiss the novel. I feel much calmer when working on a novel. I've written three of them to various stages. I think it's good to write one to prove to yourself that you can. It took me about five months to finish and start submitting. I gave up quick, and I am so glad I did because that was a sort of practice novel for me. I can't really explain it, but I'm just much calmer with the novel.

My primary concerns right now are the short story and literary essays. I'm not as calm when I write these, though, this is where I have more experience. That's sort of weird... Can anyone relate to something like that? In terms of how they revise? And poems I will spend a ridiculous amount of time on while so zoned on the language and structure and such. I can have a lot of fun with poetry revision.m For me, it can feel sort of like putting a puzzle together.

Anyway, writing in other areas only stretched other areas of my writing. You can write anything you put some dedication into. That's really all it takes. You show up and do it. And you never have to stop writing poetry to write other things too.

Okay, I'm saying it here for the first time. I will completely complete my novel next year!

 

I spent years trying to write novels and got nowhere. Long works just aren’t where my talent is. It took a long time to finally find my art form.

 

How far did you get and when was the last time you had a novel in the works? It's great that you've found something you're good at, but I think it does something good for a writer to play around in the whole arena of writing. I'm in no way saying you have to do any of that. Just sharing my thoughts with the general community.

 

I sometimes feel like I'll never be through editing something. I work from an outline in my long form writing, and so far, I haven't had any major plot stuff to rewrite, thank God, (excluding my aborted attempt at discovery writing a book) but every pass on my "finished" novel or one of my few shorts, turns up stuff that I want to reword and don't know how I could have left it so unrefined the last time.

 

Yep. I have 3 like this.
1 "finished" novella.... that, as I was editing, decided to change something and now i have to change almost everything
2 short stories where the same thing happened. Change one thing and it trigger the rest of the dominoes.

I havent touched them in months, now. I know they'll need some work. either to fix them how they were BEFORE.... or to lean into the revisions and do them.

 

There are many, many times I am temporarily satisfied with something I've written only to return to it later and think, "Argh! How did I miss THAT?" Fortunately, I usually catch it before it goes to print, but once in a while I miss something, and oh, the chagrin! Once I had to print a correction for a style of embroidery I'd misindentified in a national magazine. I still get the cauld grue and desire to beat my head against the wall thinking about that one, and it was at least half dozen years ago.

I'm one of the weirdos who doesn't mind revision and editing. It's just part of the process and I mostly like the process of writing despite its frustrations. Marketing has always been where I fall to the wayside. I have to force myself to do it. I started writing novels and short stories when I was in fourth grade and didn't have enough sense to be frightened by either form. Writing has been my idea of fun and challenge ever since. I went though a period in my early twenties when I couldn't write decent fiction since I mired everything in my own angst. I've produced a lot of less-than-stellar work, but at some point, I started producing more good than bad.

Not everything is worthy of being published. Not everything has to be finished and polished. Somethings are just practice,even if they don't start out with that intent, and that's okay. It's like dancing or playing music: one doesn't expect an audience for every class or practice session. My poor students heard that little lecture so many times, and now I've inflicted it upon yet another audience, one that probably doesn't need to hear it. Sorry, y'all. I write the way some people talk: endlessly.

 

I ask myself the same question-- how could I have left something so unrefined? But then I also have to ask myself why I failed to see how it really was in the first place.

 

Good luck! How satisfied with the work were you earn you left these projects? Have you looked at them since? Were they as you remember?

 

I don't think you're weird for liking editing and revision. I guess I'm sort of getting there. I'm close to the end of resining my 5k-ish-word short story. But right now I can see it coming out pretty good. I guess I'm looking for a bit of consistence satisfaction. Is it through the ending process you improved? do you think the editing and revision is just as inmortant as the actual writing? It might be at least tied, IMO.

I practice endlessly.

 

With 2, i was pretty satisfied with the plot... but just wanted to make a character adjustment and BOOM! the whole thing exploded on me and now i dont like it (hence the revisions )

The last one, i wasnt satisfied and keep revising and revising. each time i do, something changes... be it the plot or the characters....
This one is the only one i've looked at recently. havent written anything on it in months... but wanted to see how i felt about it now after some time has passed. it still irritates me....

 

Revision is both maddening and essential. Sometimes I surprise myself how some stories turn out. It sure does take a while to get there, but I think it's the only way.

 

That's kind of like asking if water and sunshine are as important as digging a hole and planting the seed. You aren't going to get a watermelon without all three.

Editing and revision are essential components of writing: actual, honest-to-goodness, necessary, skilled parts of writing. Any literate person can scribble down a series of sentences, call it a story, and himself/herself a writer. That's easy. Doing the literary equivalent of pulling weeds, fertilizing, and making sure the watermelon vines don't smother the petunias is every bit as important as planting that story seed in the first place, you betcha.

(How's that for a mixed salad of metaphors? )

 

Okay, so I thought that I was really almost there and now I think the whole story is just stupid. A few days ago, I thought I it was pretty good. WTF happened? How can I think something is great one day and total crap the next? I hate that this seems to happen to me during revision. Or I just hate that I write total crap sometimes.

 

Put it away and write something else. Establishing some emotional distance from one's work before revising it can be a positive thing.

 

I've found with short stories that if I put something away for too long, I just don't go back to it. I've done that too many times that I know that's a problem for me. Pretty much it can just lead me to a cycle where I write a lot of short stories that just don't get to the place I want them to be before I actually consider them polished and publishable. I do think that taking a few days is one thing. If I wait more than a week, though, I'm probably not going to go back to it.

But the story I was struggling with is now really done, I think. I recently sent it out for submission. But I do go through this love-hate relationship with pretty much everything I write. And that little rollercoaster can be quite exhausting.

 

Now that I've sent the story out I keep thinking of things I wished I had thought of sooner and ways I could have improved that piece. This is what I mean by being only temporary satisfied. Maybe the only real satisfaction I get is when something makes it into print.

 

I've heard best-selling authors express similar sentiments. You're far from alone. I feel the same way about a contest piece I sent in recently.

 

Good luck with the contest! It seems like I always think of ways my story could have been better right after I submit it. There have been a few times in the past where I have withdrawn a story shortly after submitting it only to revise and resubmit shortly after. I try not to do that. I also feel the same way even when I email a story to a friend. I'm trying to just let go and see what happens. I spend a lot of time on revision and polishing the stories I submit. And when I finally submit a piece I feel confident that I'm sending out my best. So, why doesn't that satisfaction last?

I'm onto a new story and already going through that love-hate relationship with it. I feel pretty good about it right now. But I know that feeling won't last. But when I hate this story and work on it more I know I will feel good about it again. This cycle is so maddening. On a positive note, this cycle is probably what helps me out with revision and really polishing a piece even if the stories continue to haunt me. It does help to move onto a new story. So, I guess another positive is that I'm always working on a new story after letting one go.

 

I wanted to do that with the contest but couldn't. I won though, so it must have been alright in its earlier version. (Just a friendly contest on a forum.) I've even revised a word or two since the contest ended, because I think I'll try to have it published. No doubt I'll go through the same thing after I send it off to mags.