Quotes About Editing

She reflected that the Mad Max movies had been skillfully edited to erase the actual tedium of driving through outback Australia.

You don't always have to go so far as to murder your darlings – those turns of phrase or images of which you felt extra proud when they appeared on the page – but go back and look at them with a very beady eye. Almost always it turns out that they'd be better dead. (Not every little twinge of satisfaction is suspect – it's the ones which amount to a sort of smug glee you must watch out for.

As Tolkien got older, he increasingly denied the participation of others in the creation of his work. Tolkien says this is one of the few places where Lewis's detailed criticisms were useful and just. It may be more accurate to say this is one of the few places where Tolkien specifically acknowledges the careful editing of his friend. Changes

So the writer who breeds more words than he needs, is making a chore for the reader who reads.

Brevity and conciseness are the parents of correction.

People need to be edited; life needs to be edited. I need to be edited.

The only kind of writing is rewriting.

You know you're writing well when you're throwing good stuff into the wastebasket.

There is no such thing as great writing - there is only great re-writing!

How good a book is should be judged by the man who writes it by the excellence of the material that he eliminates.

The first draft is always shit.

Just two so far," Roger said. "My counselor and I." "My counselor and me," Johnny said. "How the hell do you write books?" "I can always hire someone to put in the grammar.

I have tried to write by the old rule that how good a book is should be judged by the man who writes it by the excellence of the material that he eliminates.

There was a great deal of material that Hemingway wrote for A Moveable Feast that he decided to leave out, acting "by the old rule that how good a book is should be judged by the man who writes it by the excellence of the material that he eliminates.

Write drunk; edit sober.

After all if I'm trying to write books without any extra words I might as well stick to it.

Write the best story you can and throw out all the good lines.

Don't get discouraged because there's a lot of mechanical work to writing … I rewrote the first part of A Farewell to Arms at least fifty times….The first draft of anything is shit.

When you pick a partner, you pick a story. So what kind of story are you going to write? You are the editors of your life stories. Write well and edit often. And remember ... a life story is not a love story. You can love a lot more people than you can make a life with.

Briefer is better, so learn to write tight

Write with abandon and no constraints for first draft. Cut brutally and save in separate files on second draft. Add conflict; don't be afraid to make your characters suffer. Read what you love. Write what you love. Love.

I avoid preset sounds wherever possible, and all the sounds I use I have edited.

I tend to edit some as I go - partly because one of the reasons I don't outline much is that I don't know what the next scene will be until I've actually written the previous scene.

Chiki Sarkar edited 'Mrs Funnybones,' and she is a ruthless but kind editor to work with. The only lesson I learnt during this process was to say, 'Yes, Prime Minister,' and re-write.