Intense pain

[TheEarl]

I've lost a story. I was 90% of the way through writing it and I left the notebook on a plane. I'm not optimistic enough to think that anyone will post it to the address written on the front of the book, so I'm trying to write the story again.

However it's just not coming. The story was absolutely brilliant writing, quite easily the best thing I've written and I've lost the bugger. And now I can't reproduce the story. I can't even do it adequately, let alone well.

Has anybody else managed to rewrite a story that they've lost. If so, how the hell did you do it?

The Earl

 

[soulnovicaine]

drag...

dood, that bites...

Its happened to me a few times, either cuz my comp crashed or it just kind of faded out of existance from my notebook. I think the greatest loss is the loss of the fervant emotive state that you get into when you write something passionate and powerful.

thats like forcing romance or something.. it just doesn't happen

My only suggestions? try not to reproduce it, try instead to use the same concepts and situations, but just start again. if you dont you'll get caught in worrying about the way you wrote something or the structure of some phrase or something. Literature, especially sexual and emotional literature is something that cannot be handled in a logic way, nor should it. I think if you try to recreate yer past story, you will just end up making it dry and sterile and ruin the joy that you had as you were writing it.

Chances are, when you find a thought that you especially revel in, the words just come to you. Which is why Im sure you were writing so well when you had yer notebook, take heart, you'll regain that passion and fervor again


.joey.


__________________

 

[TheEarl]

Unfortunately it's part 3 of a three part story. The plot's good, I know what needs to happen in vague terms, the story just won't flow. I've tried twice and ended up with something I'd be ashamed to put my name to.

The Earl

 

[karmadog]

That happened to me when my last PC got lightning fried while I was finishing my chain story chapter. I tried to recreate mine too, but it didn't fly either.

What I did was take images, character quirks, and one or two descriptive sections I particularly liked from the previous story and built around them. I dropped all pretense of trying to duplicate the other story and treated what I was doing as a new story.

I ended up with a very, very different story than the original, not as good I think, but adequate.

I'm sorry for your troubles.

 

[deliciously_naughty]

earl that's horrible!

nothing like that has happenned to me (yet).

However I did just find a story I only vaguely remember writing when I was a freshman in high school (that would be 11 or so years ago) and I'm embarrassed to even read it. (for the record it's called "the silver teddy bear mystery" and it's essentially a rip off of all those christopher pike/rl stine teen horror, ancient evil stories...shudder). I'm keeping it to keep me humble.

 

[christo]

I do a lot of my writing longhand too, and I lost about 20 pages of a story. Vanished off the face of the earth. Poof. Gone.

I'd just be patient, just write as you remember it, don't worry about getting it word for word. You might find out that, as you rewrite it, what you come up with is even better than what you'd originally written.

Still, it's a pain, all that work lost. Pray to St. Anthony, the patron saint of lost objects. Maybe some generous soul will return your notebook. Or they might read it, say, "Oh my GOOOODDDDDD!" and report you to the police.

 

[TheEarl]

Well it had a good 10 pages of my 'serious' work as well as two completed stories, but they were backed up. Doubt if anyone could read one of my longhand stories anyway. So many notes and crossings out and doubling backs, etc.

The real problem is that this story that I'm currently mourning was bloody hard work to write, but somehow I managed to get something brilliant down. And now I'm writing terrible stuff just trying to get started from the same premise.

The Earl

 

[TheEarl]

Christo: How did you lose a longhand story?

The Earl

 

[Killswitch]

Earl,
Sorry Brother!!!
I am not a seasoned.....I was going to say writer, but I will say seasoned anything.
I did lose a few poems after a hard drive crash and subsequent reformatting/ installation. I was able to re-create them, but thats a few 30 line poems that I lived with for days on end writing and revising. Plus I had some lines written on napkins, backs of envelopes and such.

Did this happen on your trip back home from Toronto, I think it was?
Give it a rest...get back in the swing of your surroundings, then re read, or scan the parts that you do have....It will come to you.
You are a good writer. It will come back...but forcing it wont work.
It will be spontaneous, and will flow. It's in there somewhere.
Good luck, and let us know how it turn's out.

Killswitch

 

[Sabledrake]

Earl -- what an awful thing; my sympathies! I lost a work-in-progress once when our laptop went keys-up. It's a rotten feeling indeed.

Sabledrake

 

[christo]

How did I lose a handwritten story? If I knew THAT, I'd know where the goddam thing was!! Are you trying to drive me INSANE???

I have a very nice leather folder that I keep all my writing in, as well as other stuff, and the story I lost was in there. At least I thought it was. I'd bet that if I tore the house apart I'd find it, but I'm not ready for a six-hour cleaning jag.