Some of you are better editors than you are writers and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. You've spent a lifetime developing your taste through reading and watching films & TV - you know what's good and what's shit. Trust that superpower when you edit. End result is ultimately the same. - ThreadSky

crobertcargill.bsky.social • 91 days ago

Some of you are better editors than you are writers and there is absolutely nothing wrong with that. You've spent a lifetime developing your taste through reading and watching films & TV - you know what's good and what's shit. Trust that superpower when you edit. End result is ultimately the same.

Comments

chaotic-fox-girl-z.bsky.social•90 days ago

I can write literary essays that take people 4 weeks in about 6 hours and 2 cans of Monster. I have so many ideas for plots and scenes in my head that I could have written 4 books by now. The problem? I can't sit still to do it, and when I do, I will revise and just throw it all out.

atomicsilver.bsky.social•91 days ago

Not me, I'm a shit editor. So of course that's where my career would dump me.

thecrankycripple.bsky.social•91 days ago

My trouble is I default to edit mode when I write and find it difficult to let myself off the leash.

seandm.bsky.social•91 days ago

My problem, despite teaching English, is I'm a bloody awful editor of my own work. Really good at editing students' work though.

kilroywas-here.bsky.social•91 days ago

but I want to be good at things

drdaleplaysguitar.bsky.social•91 days ago

I think I'm appalling at both, frankly. However, it does not stop me from doing so. and over and over again...

saltasalta.bsky.social•91 days ago

Hello, whatever happened to When Gravity Fails? Really wanted to see that book turned into a movie.

crobertcargill.bsky.social•91 days ago

Company making it collapsed after three bombs in a row. In subsequent years we've been unable to track down who owns the rights to our script so we could make it.

saltasalta.bsky.social•91 days ago

Oh man, I hope it’s able to happen at some point. Time is due. It was way ahead of its time.

lmcguirek.bsky.social•91 days ago

Needed to hear this today; thank you. I just wish it didn't take so MANY drafts to generate enough raw material to get "what it needs to look like" after editing! This is today's loop.

deathspeaker.bsky.social•91 days ago

A good editor is a mother fucking demi-god as far as I'm concerned.

jamesesq.bsky.social•91 days ago

So true. I’m a shit writer, but I’m good at editing my own work. I write and the first draft is crap, but then I edit, rewrite, and revise until I have a draft that is less crappy. Anyone can do this.

lissaj.bsky.social•91 days ago

Yes I would put myself in this category

jaimekawamoto.bsky.social•91 days ago

My goal to be the next Elaine May is not taken seriously enough

conphused.bsky.social•91 days ago

I’d love to just edit other’s work. It comes so much more naturally to me than writing my own.

jjbrandis.bsky.social•91 days ago

I suspect I'm possibly a better reader than I am a writer.

more-chocolate.bsky.social•91 days ago

I've always thought there were two types of people in the world who get things done: creators and modifiers.

oldnewsy.bsky.social•90 days ago

I came to a fork in the road. The sign said “Writers this way.”
The other sign, “Editors, please inform the sign writers that a verb is needed to complete the sentence.”
I followed the editor path.

shannenenen.bsky.social•91 days ago

I'm great at poetry and nonfiction, but the moment you ask me to write any sort of fiction, my brain clams up. I've been doing some freelance editing for my friend's romantic fantasy books, and while I could never in a million years plot that out, I sure can edit the hell out of it.

fumingredhno3.bsky.social•91 days ago

OMG, people like me who have spent decades reading software engineering and programming books have it much worse. Loads of double, triple, quadruple negatives, and none of it makes sense.

jenmiley.bsky.social•91 days ago

Ha! I never thought about it, but you are 100% spot on. I am sharing your insight with my academic friends!

egwriter.bsky.social•91 days ago

I always tell my students to trust their bodies when they’re writing. I say “Your mind will lie to you all the time because that’s where the committee is. But your body will never lie to you. So when you have that sinking feeling as you’re reading what you’ve just written or even as you’re writing

egwriter.bsky.social•91 days ago

….trust it.” Bodies don’t lie.

decodingstrange.bsky.social•91 days ago

Some television dialogue is too predictable. I often finish the characters sentence, look over to my wife and say “I wrote that” LOL 😂

kjmcgee.bsky.social•91 days ago

Ah so it’s not Those who can’t Write, Edit…😎

blueaps.bsky.social•91 days ago

My problem is I'm good at spotting common tropes and "solving" the plot. It sets a very high bar. #editinghell

simoncrook.bsky.social•91 days ago

True. Would add editing uses an entirely different part of the brain to writing - the analytical motor - and far tougher imo

nitanoorad.bsky.social•91 days ago

that's true.

krisleigh-writer.bsky.social•91 days ago

This explains why I easily transition from writing to editing, but returning to writing sucks the life out of me.

simoncrook.bsky.social•91 days ago

I'm the opposite!

krisleigh-writer.bsky.social•91 days ago

Yeah…I’m weird. 😄

jordangruber.bsky.social•91 days ago

This is true, perhaps in an absolute sense, but more to the point is how you shift into and out of your right self for editing versus for writing. In *your symphony of selves,* Fadiman and I say “mental health is being in the right mind at the right time.”

cryptidmuse.bsky.social•91 days ago

What I'm hearing is: write the crappy story then edit it into a good one. Solid.

crobertcargill.bsky.social•91 days ago

And chiefly, don't be afraid that it starts out crappy.

loudmouthbroad.bsky.social•91 days ago

Shitty first drafts (and second and third drafts) are almost required

saudaderachel.bsky.social•91 days ago

Thanks.

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