Editing a published piece?

[EvesTower]

I have two published works, and would like to know how to go back and make slight tweaks to the stories, wording and phrasing mostly. Is there an easy way to do this? Or do I have to delete the entire work and resubmit it?

Thanks

 

[rae121452]

if you go to the faq area it tells how. basically, you just have to resubmit an improved copy of the story with a note that it is a revision of a published piece (i think).

 

[NotWise]

Make the changes you want to make in your copy of the story, then follow these instructions from the FAQ:

Simply submit the new version as you submitted the old one, only adding the word "EDITED" to the title (ex. "My Sexy Firefighter Ch. 03 - EDITED") so that we know to replace the old text with the new text. We will then replace the original text with the new text. Your story will retain its previous voting score and views.

Edited stories take up to 48 hours to appear correctly on the site as the pages must be regenerated by the site scripts. If after 48 hours your submission edits are still not showing, please email us a link to the work in question.

Edits can take longer than 48 hours because they are a lower priority than new stories. Also, don't email Laurel. Use PM if you need to talk with her.

 

[Voboy]

The above replies tell you how it’s done, but ethically speaking, there has to be a point at which a story is “finished.” I always think that point should be publication. If you’ve published something, then surely that’s got to be the final version, warts and all?

I still find occasional typos in my published work, and though I roll my eyes at my own lack of attention to detail, I don’t go back and change them. For better or for worse, I feel it’s a done deal when I hit submit.

Beware. Remember: George Lucas’ reputation didn’t start crashing when he released that horror The Phantom Menace. It started crashing two years before, when he sent Jabba to Mos Eisly and tried to claim Greedo shot first. The story’s got to be finished at some point; it’s unfair to fans to go changing things after publication.

 

[rjordan]

The above replies tell you how it’s done, but ethically speaking, there has to be a point at which a story is “finished.” I always think that point should be publication. If you’ve published something, then surely that’s got to be the final version, warts and all?

I still find occasional typos in my published work, and though I roll my eyes at my own lack of attention to detail, I don’t go back and change them. For better or for worse, I feel it’s a done deal when I hit submit.

Beware. Remember: George Lucas’ reputation didn’t start crashing when he released that horror The Phantom Menace. It started crashing two years before, when he sent Jabba to Mos Eisly and tried to claim Greedo shot first. The story’s got to be finished at some point; it’s unfair to fans to go changing things after publication.

There are certainly people who agree with you. Several years ago Amazon deleted a bootleg version of 1984 it had inadvertently sold to Kindle customers. The customers, having paid for the books, were pissed when they disappeared from their devices.

Amazon apologized. But it also decided not to screw with ebooks already sold when changes were made to an edition without the customer's permission.

But your idea that there must be a "final version" doesn't stand up. There were de facto final versions before ebooks because the processes used (printing, illuminating) were so indelible. It just wasn't worth it. Nevertheless, books that had more than one edition were sometimes revised for subsequent editions without any ethical considerations. Maybe some classical books intentionally retain errors.

In the age of ebooks, all that goes away, esp. on a website like this. I wouldn't submit an edited version because of typos because it's not worth the bother. But the idea that we are obligated to fans to preserve our original submission warts and all is laughable. If there is any obligation, it would be to those who have not read it yet and could be spared the warts.

rj

 

[oggbashan]

I think I should leave any stories I have entered into a themed contest as I submitted them, including any flaws, - until after the contest result has been announced. That is just my personal view.

Once a contest has ended I will edit anything obviously wrong.

Stories that were not submitted as part of a contest? I will edit them in the first week or so after posting for major errors, not minor typos. After that? I leave them alone except if I want to write a sequel and the original ending no longer fits. For example I did that with Rapunzel. In the first version I killed off Prince Johann. I had to rewrite the ending to allow for part two...

I think that many of my early stories from a decade or more ago could benefit from major rewrites. Hen Party and Stag Party are bad - in retrospect. They won't be altered. I have left them as they were to remind me that I have changed and improved as a writer. If I need to write a continuation I find it difficult to revert to the writer I was then. I can do it but it isn't easy.

My opinion is that editing out mistakes is OK. Constantly rewriting is not. Leave a posted story alone as it is. If you really want to totally rewrite it? Do it as another story and leave the original posted story alone.

 

[sr71plt]

I've never edited and resubmitted anything I've written here. I certainly wouldn't do it for a contest piece. No contest in the mainstream allows that. In most cases when I've submitted it here, it's already been in the marketplace for a year or more. When it's published, it's done. There will certainly be mistakes in it, but that's just too bad. This isn't the New Yorker. Also, anything that's being edited is taking submission time away from other authors. I don't consider myself more special than they are in access to Web site editor time. It was up to me to get it in the best shape possible before submitting it.

 

[Voboy]

It was up to me to get it in the best shape possible before submitting it.

This is a better way of expressing what I was trying to say.

I do draw a distinction between clearly labeled “revised editions” and the sort of phantom edits you’re likely to find in the e-world. I still think those are creatively dishonest.

 

[KindofHere]

..............

 

[EvesTower]

Thanks for the replies y'all, these answered my questions. Mainly I'm trying to craft an ongoing narrative, and would like the ability to go back and retcon parts of previous chapters as necessary, I don't foresee it happening too often, but I was curious just in case. Thanks again!

 

[Voboy]

Thanks for the replies y'all, these answered my questions. Mainly I'm trying to craft an ongoing narrative, and would like the ability to go back and retcon parts of previous chapters as necessary, I don't foresee it happening too often, but I was curious just in case. Thanks again!

Ah. I understand that urge; that makes more sense than fixing typos. I still wouldn’t do it; I’d work around it, and/or ignore small inconsistencies.

I retcon a lot, but I write in first person. So I can hide occasional continuity errors behind the idea that different narrators often perceive things differently. That might be one way to address your concerns.

 

[sr71plt]

It would be more polite to both the Web site and the other authors not to use the story file here as a temporary file to be rewriting at will. You'd be robbing both the site editor and the other writers of time and effort for your personal inability to close out before posting.

 

[sr71plt]

Part of the learning curve is to realize this isn't the New Yorker and that once a story is off the New list, it's shelf life has been cut down considerably. These aren't diamonds. To learn to be a writer, you learn that writing is a renewable resource. You don't continually fuss with what you've written. You go on to the next and try to build on what you've done before.

And to be a member of the writing community (and a responsible human being) you learn that it isn't all about you. The time the Web site--and the one editor here--spends on you they can't be spending on anyone else. Take your shot and then get out of the way of your fellow writers.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Combine this with the constant requests for follow-ups (very tempting for the dreamers; isn’t that the ultimate proof that readers like your stories?) and, at least to me, it makes perfect sense that people sometimes want to improve and/or modify their stories.

Would Literotica improve, if the dreamers get discouraged to improve their stories on Lit? The option is provided, and I think it is a sensible service.

With regard to follow-ups I agree (but only a little bit) that there might be a desire to go back and "fix" earlier material, but the benefit of doing so is probably limited. After all, those folk who beg for the follow-up obviously didn't get put off by whatever wasn't "right" in the story the first time; and by the time the fixed version goes up, the story will be off the first page anyway, so its primary run is over. Lots of time and effort for limited returns, I'd say.

I've only edited one story after submitting, but that was to tweak content following feedback from someone who pulled me up on disability issues (the story was about a woman in a wheelchair) - to the vast improvement of the story.

I personally think writers improve far quicker by writing the next story and making it better, rather than futzing with the one they've already submitted (and, one could argue, botched).

Better to write nine vastly improved stories and end up with a tenth spectacular one, than to rewrite one ordinary story nine times and end up with one still ordinary story, rewritten nine times.

But that's just me.

 

[ChloeTzang]

I'd just like to say thanks, that was an interesting read of everyone's views and it's helped me make up my own mind not to waste time going back and editing already posted stories. Move on to the next one!

 

[ElectricBlue]

I'd just like to say thanks, that was an interesting read of everyone's views and it's helped me make up my own mind not to waste time going back and editing already posted stories. Move on to the next one!

In your case, Chloe, given your plans to eventually publish off Lit, together with your productivity, you're in the best of both worlds. Learn your chops with high output and free advice here on Lit, then apply what you've learned either yourself or with a brutal editor when you revisit the stories to publish elsewhere.

Keep going the way you are, you'll be biting Pilot on the ass for productivity - I can just picture him, furiously pounding away in his attic, thinking, "fuck, gotta keep ahead of that bitch, she types as fast with only her right hand as I do with my left... thank Christ she don't write GM!"

 

[sr71plt]

Keep going the way you are, you'll be biting Pilot on the ass for productivity - I can just picture him, furiously pounding away in his attic, thinking, "fuck, gotta keep ahead of that bitch, she types as fast with only her right hand as I do with my left... thank Christ she don't write GM!"

Furiously, I note that I write in a very nice corner room on the second floor stuffed with bookcases of books and memorabilia of a life interestingly lived and with winter views of Monticello. And I'm content in the knowledge that ChloeTzang doesn't write GM (or, to my knowledge, espionage mysteries).

 

[8letters]

The above replies tell you how it’s done, but ethically speaking, there has to be a point at which a story is “finished.” I always think that point should be publication. If you’ve published something, then surely that’s got to be the final version, warts and all?

I still find occasional typos in my published work, and though I roll my eyes at my own lack of attention to detail, I don’t go back and change them. For better or for worse, I feel it’s a done deal when I hit submit.

I take an opposite approach - a couple of weeks after I submit a story, I submit a revised version that cleans up the errors that my readers catch. I put in the author's notes at the end of each story, "If you find any typos or grammar problems, please PM them to me and I will post a cleaned up version of this story." I'm about to submit the cleaned-up version of my latest story.

There are a number of reasons why I do this. #1 is that I hate it when readers post a comment like "It should be 'breaths' instead of 'breathes' on page 6." It's a six-page story and the commenter's only thought when he/she was done is that I made a minor mistake? By telling readers to PM me the the mistakes they catch, it reduces the number of such comments. #2 is that my stories are regularly read after the first few weeks of publication and I want my readers to have the best reading experience they can have when they read my story. Not fixing mistakes that I'm aware seems counterproductive.

Beware. Remember: George Lucas’ reputation didn’t start crashing when he released that horror The Phantom Menace. It started crashing two years before, when he sent Jabba to Mos Eisly and tried to claim Greedo shot first. The story’s got to be finished at some point; it’s unfair to fans to go changing things after publication.

That's a totally different issue. I clean up minor mistakes and don't change the plot of the story (though I'm kind of breaking that with this clean up as I have the Astros losing in the World Series and I'm going to change the story to have them win).

 

[sr71plt]

Again, you aren't the only one involved with any rework you do. By using Lit. like it was the Cloud or something, you are multiplying the work the Lit. editor has to do to accommodate you and denying other authors, who aren't this fussy and selfish, her submissions services while she's back to working on your messing about with something you jolly well should have gotten in the condition you could live with before submitting it.

 

[8letters]

Again, you aren't the only one involved with any rework you do. By using Lit. like it was the Cloud or something, you are multiplying the work the Lit. editor has to do to accommodate you and denying other authors, who aren't this fussy and selfish, her submissions services while she's back to working on your messing about with something you jolly well should have gotten in the condition you could live with before submitting it.

You have one view on how this website should be operated. Laurel has a different view.

 

[sr71plt]

Yes, she does. Are you Laurel? But I am a Lit. author who has to wait on a submission while Laurel is dealing with minor messing around by other authors who couldn't bother themselves to do their best work before submitting and then think that everyone is hanging on every post-publishing repolishing of their darling diamond.

I still call you out as being in the MeMeMe generation on this point.

 

[ChloeTzang]

......their darling diamond.

Speaking of darling diamonds, do you do your covers yourself? I've always liked them. That one for "The Aviators" is just .... yum!

 

[sr71plt]

Speaking of darling diamonds, do you do your covers yourself? I've always liked them. That one for "The Aviators" is just .... yum!

No. I participate in finding images--to the extent I want to--and the publisher takes care of the rest. Sabb, who is a Lit. member, does most of them. Someone else in his publishing house has done a couple. Thanks for liking them. They usually turn out better than my vision for them was.

 

[rjordan]

There are a number of reasons why I do this. #1 is that I hate it when readers post a comment like "It should be 'breaths' instead of 'breathes' on page 6." It's a six-page story and the commenter's only thought when he/she was done is that I made a minor mistake? By telling readers to PM me the the mistakes they catch, it reduces the number of such comments. #2 is that my stories are regularly read after the first few weeks of publication and I want my readers to have the best reading experience they can have when they read my story. Not fixing mistakes that I'm aware seems counterproductive.

Total waste of time.

1. Readers who catch minor problems have already read your story. They are unlikely to read it again and notice your rewrites.

2. The number of comments go down on a rewrite because nearly everyone who would have an interest in it probably read it the first time around.

My skin was thin and raw the first few months I started writing for a living. I heard from tough-as-nails editors and I heard from readers (they wrote letters in those days). My skin thickened, and my reaction to people who found typos became, "Is THAT all you could find. How did you miss the others?" There are ALWAYS others.

rj

 

[8letters]

Total waste of time.

1. Readers who catch minor problems have already read your story. They are unlikely to read it again and notice your rewrites.

2. The number of comments go down on a rewrite because nearly everyone who would have an interest in it probably read it the first time around.

I'm not talking about submitting a new story that is a revised version of an existing story. I'm talking about what the OP is talking about - submitting a cleaned-up version of an existing story that, when approved, overlays the existing version.

I have a unique strategy for reaching out to my readers. Having them send me errors and then me incorporating corrections in a revised version of the story is a part of it. My strategy was worked very well for me.