I rewrite obsessively; I have rewritten a scene a 30 times. Here is what I have learned.

First: I might be trying to make this scene do too much work, so I can't get it to flow smoothly and still do that amount of work. This is particularly true in the beginning of the story. It is also particularly true if you keep wanting to add details and explanation to the story.

The problem is that the beginning has a huge load of information to dump on the reader: They don't know anything about the characters, the setting, the plot, or anything else. And I am trying to find ways to explain all that in a casual introduction, that just isn't working.

The solution is to write more stuff. My typical formula for an opening is to open on the MC (Main Character), give her a "throwaway" problem to deal with (not the main problem, not a battle, just an issue from her normal everyday life), AND have her start interacting with somebody else ASAP, like within the first two pages.

So I do not try to fill the reader in about everything in the world. I've got about 15% of my story do that, in a 100,000 word story that is 15,000 words, and that is about 60 pages. The beginning of my story is designed to tell readers something important about my MC, introduce them a little bit to the setting (that's why I give her a normal everyday problem or irritation to deal with), and show readers how she deals with other people with their own aims. That will show them something about her personality. It doesn't have to be everything.

If I have magic in my story, I don't even have to introduce THAT in the first ten pages. Readers give us leeway for a few dozen pages, they are accustomed to learning what they need to learn about your setting over the course of dozens of pages and multiple scenes. So we prioritize; I want to introduce what is most important about the MC, her setting, and her ability to interact with others. It is okay to leave some details of these things unsaid, if those details are not important to this particular scene. We devise scenes for the character to reveal important information, we don't just depend on them to happen.

Second: Maybe the scene I chose is just wrong. I'm forcing something on the character that she doesn't want to do; or if you want to be more technical, subconsciously I know her, and the way I have her behaving in this scene doesn't fit the personality I think I know.

I need to spend time thinking if I can use some other scene to convey the information I want to convey. That might start with me analyzing the scene, and trying to figure out what the heck I think is the most important thing for the reader to take away from the scene. Am I trying to reach a plot point that my character isn't really ready for? I might be rewriting because I sense there is something wrong, with the way the scene gets done, or the way my character acts in it, or just the logic of the scene. Why does she agree to a date with a new guy in the office, without knowing anything about him? Is she actually that impulsive? Is she actually that needy, or that horny? Am I forcing her to say yes when she should be disdainful, because the guy doesn't know a damn thing about her but what she looks like?

Third: Maybe I am missing a scene, before it, or after it. This is like "making it do too much work", but the reason I am rewriting is because I should have had earlier scenes that showed the key information needed to understand THIS scene. I frequently find this to the be case, and I have moved my opening "back in time" three times in a book. What I thought would be a good opening was actually Chapter 3, and Chapter's 1 and 2 had to be written to actually GET to Chapter 3. Which then was streamlined and turned into a good scene, because then the reader learned the context that they needed to know back in Chapter 1 or 2, and I didn't spend a lot of time explaining, which slows down the narrative and bogs down the reader with stuff to memorize.

Fourth: A lack of imagination on my part. I've written a scene, and it sounds boring. If I'm not overloading the reader, then the problem is the scene itself doesn't seem to DO anything, and I'm trying to pretty it up. I need to imagine something better than the scene I've got. Again, this is deciding, analytically, just what the point of the scene is supposed to be, what is the reader supposed to learn from it? What does it DO? Explain something about the setting? About the character, or her relationships? About the plot, the "main problem" the character must solve? Or advance a sub-plot, a romantic issue, or fixing a broken relationship, or dealing with some minor problem or complication? Or introducing any of these things?

For me, obsessive rewriting is okay, but I want to know why I am obsessively rewriting. What is wrong with the scene?

On some key scenes, I accept it. For example, if the scene is where my MC meets a love interest, I might rewrite that scene until, on a read through, I simply cannot think of anything to change, not a word, not a punctuation mark.

Hemingway claims he rewrote his ending scenes over twenty times.

Another tactic used by writers is to put the scene aside for a week, work on other things, then rewrite that scene from a blank page and memory; to see what was memorable about it. That's what is probably important about it, and in comparison you can see what superfluous elements you have included. Then decide to NOT include them, but explain them either earlier in the story (creating new scenes if you must), or later in the story, or not at all.

I am a discovery writer, each of my scenes flows from what I think is the smartest thing for each character to do next to advance their cause, and let the chips fall where they may. But that is not infallible, and I end up having to backtrack and rewrite a lot. Often I have to add difficulties, or find a way to make the smartest thing to do actually backfire. Or to prohibit that smartest thing, by putting a roadblock in their path, some bad luck or disaster in their path, so their "smartest thing" isn't so great anymore.

That demands being a little brutal with your scenes, employing the writing adage "Kill your darlings". This means, you may love the scene, but you have to get rid of it because it is ruining your story. You can of course save it elsewhere, lift some descriptions or dialogue from it to use elsewhere, but some scenes (particularly wish-fulfillment scenes) are just too easy, and need to be justified by hardships and struggles to be dramatically useful.

---

(0)

Login to post a comment!