Writing How-to: Week 4 - Editing

Welcome to week four of this five week series. Editing is this weeks topic. You can also visit last weeks post by clicking here.

Editing is the final step before the last process, and it's possibly the most important. During editing you will be going through and reading what you have already written. The best way to do this is reading aloud, even if it is in a soft tone. This allows you to get a better understand of how things will be read by others, and how your work speaks. Even though something may sound good in your head, it may not sound good once you read it aloud.

With revising you are supposed to remove any short or unnatural sentences, but those can still make their way past the revising process. Reading aloud helps you understand how things are read, but it also helps with redundancy, usage errors, and vagueness/technical. Before we get to the examples of editing that we used for revising last week, let's go over these three issues.

Redundancy - This word means two things, using words or phrases that mean the same thing and using the same word over and over. "Black in color" and "Repeat again" are both meaning the same thing, black already being a color and repeat is a synonym for again.

Here's an example of using the same word over and over. "The pony ran across the town with fast speed. I noticed the pony was looking a bit upset. The pony was a very small, but stout build." Notice how many times "the pony" was used? These can easily be replaced for synonyms or different descriptions. "The pony ran across the town with fast speed. I noticed they were looking a bit upset. It was a very small, but stout build."

Usage errors - This one is pretty simple. When reading aloud, make sure that the words are used correctly. You're, your. They're, there, their. Effect, affect.

Vagueness/Technical - Being too technical is just as bad as being too vague. Words like nice, sad, and happy are too vague and should be used for synonyms when describing something. It's okay if a character says the words, as normal people in every day life will use vague descriptions, just be careful with how vague you are.

The same can be said for technical words. Things like vascular, cerebrum, and hemoglobin may be too difficult for your average reader. Dumbing down your work isn't always necessary, especially when writing science fiction or hospital dramas, but it also isn't necessary for your normal love story. If you must use technical words, try to explain it as delicately as possible. Having you readers go to google every five seconds will turn them off of your work.

So let's begin from last weeks revision.

Revised - The door struck the wall as it was shoved open, and a short, loud slam shook the room. Celestia's cup of tea spilled from the sides as it rattled, splashing the saucer below. The princess looked to see who had disturbed her afternoon break. She opened her mouth to lash out at the interruption, but she stopped, immediately recognizing the purple alicorn who stood at the door. Before she could greet her close friend, Twilight rushed and jumped onto the table. The purple pony stared with vacant eyes, her cheeks were as puffy as balloons, the eerie sight gave Celestia the shivers.

Edited - The door struck the wall as it was shoved open and a short, loud slam shook the room. Celestia's cup of tea spilled from the sides as it rattled, splashing the saucer below. The princess looked to see who had disturbed her afternoon break. She opened her mouth to lash out, but she hesitated, immediately recognizing the purple alicorn standing in the doorway. Before she could greet her close friend, Twilight rushed and jumped onto the table. The purple pony stared with vacant eyes, her cheeks were as puffy as balloons, the eerie sight gave Celestia the shivers.

Not much has changed from the revised paragraph.

"The door struck the wall as it was shoved open and a short, loud slam shook the room." A comma was removed from in front of "open" as it was not needed.

"She opened her mouth to lash out, but she hesitated, immediately recognizing the purple alicorn standing in the doorway." I removed "at the interruption" as it really wasn't need and didn't flow properly. Changing "stopped" to "hesitated" removed the vagueness of the description. I also changed around the "who stood at the door" with "standing in the doorway". This makes it flow more fluently when reading the sentence.

That's all the edits that were made. While it seems like it's difficult, reading and rereading the sentences aloud takes more time than you'd think. If you are unsatisfied with your sentence or paragraph, feel free to remove the entire thing. If you're not satisfied, your readers won't be either. Editing takes just as much revising as the revising step itself.

Next week is the final step of this five week series, and it's also the easiest.

Click here for Week 5

~TheTimeSword