Rewriting the past

[Djmac1031]

Not a question or advise kinda thing so much as just some observations.

I've been working on a sequel to one of my most popular stories, The White Room.

When I published it over a year ago, it was the most difficult thing I'd ever attempted.

It was also the longest, coming in at a whopping 4 whole LE pages. I know, I can hear some of you snickering now. But to me, that was a novel.

After much debate, I've decided to rewrite the thing, tweak it just a bit to get it to match closer in some minor details with the sequel.

But as I've been going through the original draft, I'm discovering just how green i still was, and how much I've learned since.

Long, run on sentences. Over used or unnecessary adjectives. Repeated, redundant use of "I said / she said."

I'm also fixing a long embarrassing mistake in which I misused the word "prone," along with several ridiculous spelling errors.

I'm glad I decided to do this, if only for my own continued education and growth as a writer.

At the time I'd published the story, it was absolutely my best effort. But I'm glad for the opportunity to revisit and improve it, even if only for myself.

I suppose once I publish the sequel, I could include a note encouraging past readers of the original to revisit the new edit.

In the end that doesn't matter much I suppose. But at least I know it's been improved for the occasional new reader who comes along.

Edit: just to clarify, I have not yet published the new edit of the original, still working on it.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

I have so many stories I would love to revise. Some because of mistakes, and a few others just to clarify what I was trying to convey. Only thing is, I'm not sure how many stories they will allow me to re-submit as edited versions.

Once you get yours done, you should let your readers know that you've revised it. And I'm sure you'll gets lots of people wanting to read it.

 

[Djmac1031]

I have so many stories I would love to revise. Some because of mistakes, and a few others just to clarify what I was trying to convey. Only thing is, I'm not sure how many stories they will allow me to re-submit as edited versions.

Once you get yours done, you should let your readers know that you've revised it. And I'm sure you'll gets lots of people wanting to read it.

It's gonna be awhile. I'm going to edit the original, but probably wait to resubmit until I finish the sequel.

That way, on the chance I may need to tweak anything else in the first one, I still can.

When both are done, I'll submit the reedit first, wait for that to be published before submitting the sequel. And yeah, I'll put a note about the edit there.

 

[alohadave]

Leave it be. You could revise work forever as skills increase or tastes change. It's a record of what you wrote.

Just look at what George Lucas did to his movies, every new version made them worse and worse, while ostensibly adding part with better technology.

 

[TheRedChamber]

I'm in a similiar situation myself at the moment. A lot of the advice on the forum says don't go back and rewrite your first story, but push on and write something else, so I have been doing. I decided early on that once I got to 20 stories, I'd do some gardening. Remove the ones which I really think aren't very good (not necessarily the lowest scoring ones) and maybe go in and revise the ones I think are better.

Now, I'm at the 20 story mark, I'm still kind of hesitating. It might be a good exercise to revise and improve the stories, but I also kind of feel like I'd be the only one who cares (and maybe that's reason enough). Maybe it's different from you as you've got a sequel coming and people will be seeking out the original. I'd be interested to know what other writers do in regards to keeping their portfolio tiptop and shipshape.

 

[Djmac1031]

Leave it be. You could revise work forever as skills increase or tastes change. It's a record of what you wrote.

Just look at what George Lucas did to his movies, every new version made them worse and worse, while ostensibly adding part with better technology.

Don't worry, no CGI creature additions to my tale, lol.

ALL I'm really doing is fixing a lot of technical stuff, just making it a cleaner read.

Not changing the story itself at all.

 

[Voboy]

...so you're keeping the original up alongside the revision? I think that would be interesting.

If you're replacing the original with the revision, then you're George Lucas pissing off his fans and ruining the work they love.

Are you looking for advice? Or just bouncing ideas off the universe? Personally, I think that once a work is published, it's PUBLIC; it's done, a finished work, out in the world to stand or fall on its own. It needs to stay finished. On to the next one.

My feeling is that if you say the original is your most popular work? Let it remain. I wouldn't touch it. It's been doing fine on its own merits: let it keep doing fine. Let it go.

But, again, posting the two side-by-side might be an interesting notion. Your call, ultimately.

 

[Djmac1031]

I'm in a similiar situation myself at the moment. A lot of the advice on the forum says don't go back and rewrite your first story, but push on and write something else, so I have been doing. I decided early on that once I got to 20 stories, I'd do some gardening. Remove the ones which I really think aren't very good (not necessarily the lowest scoring ones) and maybe go in and revise the ones I think are better.

Now, I'm at the 20 story mark, I'm still kind of hesitating. It might be a good exercise to revise and improve the stories, but I also kind of feel like I'd be the only one who cares (and maybe that's reason enough). Maybe it's different from you as you've got a sequel coming and people will be seeking out the original. I'd be interested to know what other writers do in regards to keeping their portfolio tiptop and shipshape.

I highly doubt I'll rewrite any others from my past. It is a lot of work. And frankly they naysayers are right in that most readers will never know anyway.

But I also feel this is a good exercise for me and my continuing growth as a writer; being now able to go back and spot better ways to say things and make my story flow better, less clunky.

 

[Smuttyandfun]

I actually have revised a few of my stories, but only so I could let a few friends read them. I didn't make any major changes to the stories themselves, but I felt a lot better re-reading them without all the little mistakes that I'd let slip through when they were first published.

 

[Djmac1031]

...so you're keeping the original up alongside the revision? I think that would be interesting.

If you're replacing the original with the revision, then you're George Lucas pissing off his fans and ruining the work they love.

Are you looking for advice? Or just bouncing ideas off the universe? Personally, I think that once a work is published, it's PUBLIC; it's done, a finished work, out in the world to stand or fall on its own. It needs to stay finished. On to the next one.

My feeling is that if you say the original is your most popular work? Let it remain. I wouldn't touch it. It's been doing fine on its own merits: let it keep doing fine. Let it go.

But, again, posting the two side-by-side might be an interesting notion. Your call, ultimately.

Again, to clarify; I'm not changing the STORY. All I'm doing is correcting technical mistakes, changing some grammar to make sentences and paragraphs flow better.

 

[Djmac1031]

Just to give an example of what I'm talking about.

Original version:
"Then the lights became a rainbow over both of us. The colors were spectacular in their brilliance."

New, edited version:
"Finally, the lights became a rainbow above us, the colors spectacular in their brilliance."

Just changing clunky sentences to something a little better while leaving the essence intact.

 

[SimonDoom]

We're all different on this issue. I have never had any desire to rewrite old stories. I reread them from time to time and catch errors, but I have no desire to fix them. One reason, I suppose, is I have such a long backlog of unwritten stories, and they keep me busy enough.

 

[Djmac1031]

We're all different on this issue. I have never had any desire to rewrite old stories. I reread them from time to time and catch errors, but I have no desire to fix them. One reason, I suppose, is I have such a long backlog of unwritten stories, and they keep me busy enough.

Trust me I get it. If I wasn't finally writing a sequel to this particular story, I probably wouldn't bother.

But again, I am finding it a helpful exercise in improving my writing, correcting my own mistakes and, more importantly, understanding them as mistakes I didn't recognize before.

I feel it will certainly help future new stories, including the sequel I'm working on.

So to me, it's worth the effort.

 

[KeithD]

...so you're keeping the original up alongside the revision? I think that would be interesting.

I don't think that's permitted here if Laurel is aware of it.

 

[Djmac1031]

I don't think that's permitted here if Laurel is aware of it.

And that's not what I'm doing. He misunderstood.

I'm editing the original and when done will submit it to replace the old version.

 

[KeithD]

Each time I revisit a story to be published elsewhere, I've done some rewriting. Most of what I eventually publish to Lit. is a rewrite of what was in the marketplace--and usually a somewhat fuller version.

 

[ElectricBlue]

Only thing is, I'm not sure how many stories they will allow me to re-submit as edited versions.

If you think you must, as many as you like; but ask yourself, why?

I'm with those who say, why bother? - unless there's some spectacular technical cock up or an egregious mistake. Put the effort into the next story, not the last one, I reckon. That way you have one more story which, one assumes, will be better.

 

[lovecraft68]

I did a thread about this a couple of years ago. I was invited to be a part of a Halloween Anthology with a taboo theme and the only story I had which fit word count was 9 years old and when I pulled it up to give it a read through...ugh. Not just some grammar stuff, but even the word choices, descriptions and other things I was like...damn.

I made it kind of a test of me then and me at this time and put a lot of work into making it a much better story.

Here's the thread if you want to take a look

https://forum.literotica.com/threads/writing-exercise-revisiting-an-old-story.1551963/

 

[GrantBricksly]

I actually just submitted (a few days ago) a request to remove 5 of my stories. They were my first ever stories, written back in 2014. If you read them, and then read my most recent one, you would probably wonder if they were written by the same person. My writing skills have improved so much over the years. I still like the premise of the stories, so I MAY, down the road, re-write them and submit them again. But they will likely be different enough that they would no longer count as edits, thus the deletions for now.

Sure, maybe you are the only one who is going to know or realize it. But That's just having pride in what you have out there to represent you. I've got several edits submitted (not live yet) to some of my stories, changing some minor errors as well as changing character names. Does anyone but me care? Probably not. But I care. I want my works to be the best representation of my skill that they can be.

So I say go for it! Make your changes. Submit your edit when you are ready. And make sure to let me know, cause I will read it. I enjoyed that story. It was intriguing.

 

[Djmac1031]

I did a thread about this a couple of years ago. I was invited to be a part of a Halloween Anthology with a taboo theme and the only story I had which fit word count was 9 years old and when I pulled it up to give it a read through...ugh. Not just some grammar stuff, but even the word choices, descriptions and other things I was like...damn.

I made it kind of a test of me then and me at this time and put a lot of work into making it a much better story.

Here's the thread if you want to take a look

https://forum.literotica.com/threads/writing-exercise-revisiting-an-old-story.1551963/

Yes! That's EXACTLY my experience with this.

I honestly didn't expect my original to need as much editing as it does.

Besides a few more obvious spelling and grammar mistakes, I really just wanted to change a particular characters dialog to italics to match something I'm doing in the sequel. The reason is to distinctly highlight that characters voice for reasons explained in story.

But wow, yeah, the other stuff I'm finding. Mixed tenses, repeated verbs and adjectives, the whole "stood up / sat down" thing, clunky transitions, run on sentences....and oh yeah, ellipsis lol.

Oh, and to everyone saying "just work on another story," I am. Because I'm also writing the sequel to the one I'm editing. Along with several other new ones.

I'm appreciating how this exercise is helping me learn to be a better writer by finding and fixing past mistakes to improve something I, at the time, thought was "good enough."

I thought I'd share only because I thought some might enjoy the conversation, not to suggest everyone else do it.

To each their own.

 

[BobbyBrandt]

I currently have seven stories posted that all spawned to one degree or another from my very first story.

This "foundation" story has some grammatical or other technical issues that I could nitpick about, but I have never had the urge to edit it in any way. I believe that doing so would be disrespectful to the hundreds of thousand readers who have already viewed it, the dozens who commented on it, and the votes which have made it one of my most popular stories.

When I decided to write the first sequel to this story, naturally, I was locked into what had already been written. My challenge as a writer was to make any sequel do justice to what had previously been written, not to dig up the foundation and rebuild it. Otherwise, it would be like taking scissors to a puzzle piece just to make it fit where I wanted.

 

[KeithD]

I believe that doing so would be disrespectful to the hundreds of thousand readers who have already viewed it, the dozens who commented on it, and the votes which have made it one of my most popular stories.

You can edit a story without losing views/votes/comments.

 

[lovecraft68]

I currently have seven stories posted that all spawned to one degree or another from my very first story.

This "foundation" story has some grammatical or other technical issues that I could nitpick about, but I have never had the urge to edit it in any way. I believe that doing so would be disrespectful to the hundreds of thousand readers who have already viewed it, the dozens who commented on it, and the votes which have made it one of my most popular stories.

When I decided to write the first sequel to this story, naturally, I was locked into what had already been written. My challenge as a writer was to make any sequel do justice to what had previously been written, not to dig up the foundation and rebuild it. Otherwise, it would be like taking scissors to a puzzle piece just to make it fit where I wanted.

Who says it has to be drastically rewritten? In my example it was more about fixing grammar issues and dropping some extra lines here and there that were either meaningless or repetitive, I didn't change any of the actual story itself just made it easier to read. No one is coming back to reread it, newer readers will see the better version. As Keith just said, you don't lose whatever numbers are attached to the original here.

Mine was done for a paid anthology so there was some extra incentive to produce a better version.

 

[SabrinaGLangton]

Not a question or advise kinda thing so much as just some observations.

I've been working on a sequel to one of my most popular stories, The White Room.

When I published it over a year ago, it was the most difficult thing I'd ever attempted.

It was also the longest, coming in at a whopping 4 whole LE pages. I know, I can hear some of you snickering now. But to me, that was a novel.

After much debate, I've decided to rewrite the thing, tweak it just a bit to get it to match closer in some minor details with the sequel.

But as I've been going through the original draft, I'm discovering just how green i still was, and how much I've learned since.

Long, run on sentences. Over used or unnecessary adjectives. Repeated, redundant use of "I said / she said."

I'm also fixing a long embarrassing mistake in which I misused the word "prone," along with several ridiculous spelling errors.

I'm glad I decided to do this, if only for my own continued education and growth as a writer.

At the time I'd published the story, it was absolutely my best effort. But I'm glad for the opportunity to revisit and improve it, even if only for myself.

I suppose once I publish the sequel, I could include a note encouraging past readers of the original to revisit the new edit.

In the end that doesn't matter much I suppose. But at least I know it's been improved for the occasional new reader who comes along.

Edit: just to clarify, I have not yet published the new edit of the original, still working on it.

I would love to rewrite my older stories. I have a hard time reading some of them because of grammar and the 'said' issues too, just like you. You have such a large library of stories all hot, your readers I am sure love you. Personally, I decided to spend my time working on something new and letting my old works live as they were, ha. But sometimes when I drink a glass of wine, really late at night, and re-read my old tales I do clean them up a bit, just for me, I don't tell anyone, ha. Good luck re-writing...

 

[BobbyBrandt]

You can edit a story without losing views/votes/comments.

I understand that, but it would alter the work that all those readers accepted, faults and all.