For the past few weeks, I have been tackling something enormous: rewriting. It may sound like an easy task; the blocks are already there, so many sentences have already been written, the structure has been created, so what could be so difficult about having to rewrite it?
Well, for anyone who doesn’t know, rewriting is more troublesome than writing. There could be people out there who disagree, but I would be confident in saying, for most writers, writing is the easy part. When there’s a blank page, there’s total freedom. It can be daunting, the fear of all that potential can be debilitating, but once you are able to tackle that fear, a blank page is a space to fill. You can put anything there. It doesn’t matter if it isn’t brilliant, because you can make it brilliant with editing.
A page full of words you know is going to have to change is much more daunting. Of course, this is a form of editing, but there’s something distinct about rewriting versus editing. With editing, that’s a form of refinement. You might not have to change entire chapters, rewrite every single sentence, delete entire sections to craft stronger ones. That’s not to say these things might not be a part of editing as it can involve major changes, especially in the early edits of a manuscript.
Ultimately, however, with editing, you’re not often having to rework everything you’ve written, and you can narrow your focus to make the task more manageable; one edit might be a simple reread to check from grammar and spelling; another edit might be to adjust a certain character’s dialogue as you’ve changed their motivation; yet another might be focusing on tone, honing in on certain paragraphs to make sure the adjectives and adverbs used are creating the mood you had intended. For me, there is a distinction between editing and rewriting, though editing does, of course, include elements of rewriting, particularly when receiving external critiques.
Rewriting is its own beast. It’s not simply altering a few paragraphs or even rearranging chapters: it’s the process of looking at what you have written, whether that be a few months or even a few years ago, and knowing it’s all got to change. Perhaps you’ve developed as an author and you know what was originally written no longer aligns with your calibre as it currently stands. Perhaps you’ve had some critique and you understand how much needs to change to make it stronger. Perhaps you’ve had a long, hard look at the manuscript, at the story as a whole, and you know it cannot continue as it currently stands, that it needs a hefty overhaul to progress. Whatever it may be, acknowledging a rewrite is a heavy task, even if you do know it’s for the better.
I last touched the manuscript of Project #2 in 2021. It was only upon finally opening up the folders where I kept those early drafts that I realised just how long it has been since I was actually writing this project. In the years that have passed since then, I’ve been working on the story as a whole, building the world, or perhaps not even thinking about it as other stories and worlds grasped my attention. It was never far away, I’ve always loved this story and these characters, and I’ve always known I would write it again one day. But actually being in the manuscript has been so far from my focus, I hadn’t even realised just how many years had passed since I last wrote a word of the story.
I have known for some time now that it was going to be quite an undertaking when it was time to return to the manuscript. Almost five years have passed, and I have grown as a writer and as a person. I knew, whatever state the manuscript was in, there was a high possibility not much of it would be salvageable. That’s not to say I am not immensely proud of having written this book all those years ago, but it is to say that, when you can see the physical evidence of how you wrote in the past, you get to acknowledge how much stronger you are now.
For some, this is harrowing. I’ve mentioned it before that people can find reading their old works quite traumatising, but I’ve always believed you should take heart in perhaps cringing at your old writing; if you’re cringing, you know you can do so much better now, it’s very physical evidence of your growth. I’ve always thought you should find some charm in reading your previous attempts at symbolism or reading aloud dialogue that is far too forced so you can write sentences you think sound monumental. When I do read back the previous draft of Project #2, I take heart in those attempts, and I also must thank the older version of myself who has given me this foundation as a writer; none of us would be where we are now without older versions of ourselves putting in the work.
That doesn’t mean it’s a smooth process. In fact, it’s an incredibly slow one. With almost five years having passed between these drafts, there is very little of it that I am able to use. The structure is still one I’m following but, even a few chapters in, I’ve altered things to make it stronger, changing around certain points, deleting elements that no longer aid the story as a whole. And it takes time. Where you might be able to get a whole chapter written in a few hours (depending on length and a whole host of other factors), it now takes me days to get through a single chapter. I’m reading what I’ve previously written, absorbing the beats and making a note of the points that need to be made, and then I’m writing them out again, almost from scratch. It does make it stronger, any rewrite does.
But it takes time. With something fresh, you might need only one document open; with rewriting, I’m lucky if I have less than five open: I need the new draft, the previous one, the worldbuilding documents, sometimes character descriptions, and an outline too. Occasionally, I’ll need to open the map as well as the accompanying document with its details of said map. Flitting through all of that alone takes time, then add on reading what you’ve written and writing it all again. That’s certainly not going to be done in just a few days. But creating something with love does take time, and I love this story, even if it is arduous to write the entire book from the very beginning.
So all of this is to say the process of rewriting is not easy. From having to potentially suffer through reading your old writing to skimming through since-completed worldbuilding documents for a specific fact you could mention that will strength your world just for saying it, it’s a consuming process. But it is necessary. If you want your works to get stronger, particularly ones that might be years old and mostly untouched, it’s something you’re going to struggle to escape. It will, however, be worth it.
Endure the cringe, take heart in the foundations your previous self built, and push forward, even through the exhaustion, because the result will be an absolute triumph, however long it takes you to get there.
Robyn x
R. A. Howard 