Editing and Polishing - How Much is Enough?

A few days ago, I critiqued a chapter for a writer I'd been working with for some months. The main thing we'd been working on was 'de-cluttering' her writing. In many sections of her work her natural style came through: it was smooth and easy to read, and I could see the promise there.

In other sections, the pace slowed down dramatically. The action was explained and then explained again in slightly different words. Really, there was no need to 'explain' it at all. Readers bring a vast amount of experience to every book they read. They have seen countless movies and TV shows; they watch the nightly news coverage; they read books, magazines and newspapers. Want proof?

I'm going to write a list of common events. Note the images that come into your mind when you read these words. driving a car

I'm sure you were able to fill in most of the details from your own viewing or reading or personal experience. All I need to do as a writer is to use the viewpoint character in the scene as a 'filter' for the setting, emotions and immediate impressions. You can supply the rest.

Now let's go back to the writer whose work I was critiquing. Ms. Writer had started to cut a lot of the clutter in her scenes, but I was still finding plenty to work on.

But this time... no. I hardly had to touch it. What had made the difference?

I emailed her with congratulations and asked what she'd been doing. I thought she may have spent more time editing, this time, before sending it off to me. Or perhaps she had put some distance between herself and the writing by putting it aside for a week before polishing?

Her answer surprised me - although it shouldn't have. For a change, she told me, she'd sent this one virtually hot off the computer. After my response, she had come to the conclusion that maybe she'd spent too much time editing in the past - tinkering with it then tinkering some more. Now she was wondering if all she'd done was make it unnecessarily wordy!

An interesting question. Had she simply added clutter? Is it better to just write something, give it a quick read through, and then leave it? When have we done enough editing? When have we fiddled with something too much? Is there any way to know?

That, of course, is the hard part. At what point might we start to spoil a piece of writing instead of make it better?

There isn't a pat answer. If there were, someone would have made a fortune by now selling you the secret. What you have to do is discover your own needs as a writer. You may be one of those who improves a piece of writing immeasurably

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