A Quote by Bernard Malamud
Somewhere I put it this way: first drafts are for learning what one’s fiction wants him to say. Revision works with that knowledge to enlarge and enhance an idea, to reform it. Revision is one of the exquisite pleasures of writing.
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First drafts are for learning what your novel or story is about. Revision is working with that knowledge to enlarge and enhance an idea, to re-form it.... The first draft of a book is the most uncertain-where you need guts, the ability to accept the imperfect until it is better.
Revision is one of the exquisite pleasures of writing.
The writing is what gives me the joy, especially editing myself for the page, and getting something ready to show to the editors, and then to have a first draft and get it back and work to fix it, I love reworking, I love editing, love love love revision, revision, revision, revision.
My life is constant revision but it's not revision, a lot of it is for the first time.
Revision plays a very large role in writing. Sometimes it seems to be all revision. And the longer I write, the more I revise-until it is completely right.
I write first drafts by hand, often out of the house somewhere, and then, when I've got a draft, type it up and let it sit, sometimes for a long time, and then when I'm ready, I work on revision.
All the revision in the world will not save a bad first draft: for the architecture of the thing comes, or fails to come, in the first conception, and revision only affects the detail and ornament, alas!
I'm a passionate believer in revision, and a lot of my writing gets done during revision process. It isn't just tweaking: I tend to break it apart and remake it every time I do a new draft.
God Himself has reserved no right of revision of His own laws nor is there any need for Him for any such revision.
Students need to be reminded that revision isn't merely making a few cosmetic changes. Revision is seeing and then reseeing our words and practicing strategies that make a difference in our writing.
With time some poems just fall by the wayside. Other poems get better over time with revision, revision, revision. My ladybug poem took 10 minutes to write but was 10 years in the making.
I don't have a schedule, but I can write for hours non-stop. If I'm drafting a book, I try and do a chapter a day. I dislike first drafts. Revision is a lot more fun, but it takes years.
The European Union and Russia have an identical viewpoint. We have condemned any potential revision of the ABM treaty, believing that such a revision will involve a risk of proliferation that will be very dangerous for the future.
The revision of the books of Judges, Samuel, and Kings, undertaken towards the end of the Babylonian exile, a revision much more thorough than is commonly assumed, condemns as heretical the whole age of the Kings.
The biggest takeaway from a memoir is that you have to play fair. Within the first draft, I was writing very angrily because I had a lot of resentment and a lot to process. Through revision is where a lot of learning happened and a lot of forgiveness happened.
My advice to writers: thank goodness we can revise and adjust and tighten and rethink before going public with our words. Revision is our friend. Our best friend. I love revision.
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