A Track Record

A track record is important to both free-lance editors and writers, playwrights included. A track record helps editors get editing jobs and writers get grants and publication. As a writer, with a couple of publication credits online and in print, my track record is insignificant; however, as a playwright, with a long list of recognition, grants and awards, my track record is quite impressive. My first short play that I wrote while attending graduate school was awarded a finalist along with my professor's. My first full-length play, thanks to the help of Dr. Williams and Dr. Gianakaris, it was also a finalist of a prestigious national playwriting competition. Ever since, I've received recognition, staged readings, and productions of my plays and won grants.

With a knee injury and the loss of income, I searched for emergency funds for writers only to find I wasn't qualified for being a writer. However, as a playwright, my artist's resume showed almost every other year I accomplished something, such as being a finalist; I was awarded a grant from the Dramatists Guild. If I hadn't built my credits, I wouldn't have been qualified.

Now I'm working hard to build my track record as a writer. Brick by brick, shovel by shovel, I'm building.

Objective Eyes

We writers all know we need someone to read our work to give us some feedback. Even Steven King would let his wife read his ms and give him constructive criticism. How many writers are that lucky to get their spouses' help? I don't know how many and I'm not one of them. Most of the time, I'll show Wes my writing after I finish it. He is a superb reader, no doubt about that; however, he doesn't know how to give useful feedback. Every time after he reads my writing, he'll say, "It's very good." That doesn't help, does it?

It's hard to see what's there and what's not there but should be there in our own writings because everything is in our heads and we automatically think everything is there. It happens because we can't it objectively. Finally, I developed my own pair of objective eyes, not 100% objective, though. It takes lots of writing, rewriting, and reading, and of course time to get myself that pair of eyes. Nothing comes easy. It takes practice. And, with the objective eyes, I'll be benefited for the rest of my writer's life. Try it. You'll enjoy the extra pair of eyes you've acquired.

A Writer's Eyes

In a non-writer's eyes, what comes to mind when she sees an egg? Scrambled. Poached. Or sunny-side-up. In a writer's eyes, however, an egg can become a symbol, a metaphor, a simile, or a motif in a play, a short story, a novel, or a poem. That's what I mean "a writer's eyes."

From my own experience, a writer's eyes differ from what she writes. For years, I've had a playwright's eyes because I worked on nothing else but plays. Since I explored literary writing, I've had a poet's eyes, a fiction writer's eyes, a creative nonfiction writer's eyes. And I've found that although the kinds of writing mentioned above belong to literary writing, a poet's eyes differ from a fiction writer's, and so on. And writing haiku gives me another pair of writer's eyes. You have to write different genres to see what I mean.

In summary, I think the more eyes a writer has the better.

Figure Skating & Writing

Figure skaters have to pack all the required elements into their two-and-half-minute short programs and their five-minute long programs. A fiction writer has to include all the required elements in her short story and novel. When I first watched figure skating in the 1990s, I simply enjoyed a sport. A sport that has beauty, artistry, and elegance. Years later, sinceI explored literary writing, I've watched the sport with a pair of writer's eyes, paying attention to how the skaters put their programs together.

Interestingly, judges, who reward a skater with high score, look for many qualities. Among them are detail and transition. Aren't detail and transition also what we writers have to heed? In truth, there're other aspects, from which I can draw parallels between the sport and writing. I pick these two because I've found that they're the areas I need to work on.

With the winter Olympics going on in Vancouver B.C., I can feast my eyes with all the graceful movements and at the same time enjoy being reminded of what it takes to be a good writer.

Purple Prose

Personally, I'm not a fan of purple prose. The writing itself is impressive; however, I read it somewhere this kind of writing belonged to writers of the Nineteenth and the early Twentieth Centuries, because writing in the Twenty-first Century, writers are competing with so many things resulted from technology: TV, computer, laptop, Smart Phone, IPhone, IPad, video games, to name a few. According to some statistics, only 60% of readers who put down the book will pick it up again. And purple prose tends to slow down the story. It's the place where a reader closes up the book and puts it away.

Someone may argue: purple prose is stylist and literary writing. I won't argue that one. I believe writers have their own tastes and preferences. As a writer, I prefer simplistic and direct style and have been writing in such manner. Also, another sign of good writing is vigorous writing. Purple prose tends to lack the vigor. Agree? Or disagree?

Self-Editing III

While I'm self-editing my first novel The Jade Pendant Tale, I can't stop writing about self-editing. It's fun but also a lot of work. The important thing is to keep a pair of objective eyes. It's easier said than done. That's why we writers need professional editors to give our manuscripts a pair of fresh eyes.

The other day, I found a "new" way to self-edit my novel. I'll use the new-found skill and see how much it'll help me. Plenty, I believe. Since I'm still in the first phase of self-editing, I don't have to search for an editor now. When I'm close to finishing up all the necessary steps I can do for my novel, I will definitely look for a free-lance editor. A good one. One with a track record.

Self-Editing II

Self-editing takes a lot of work but is also a lot of fun. Like I said last time, I'd focus on one thing at a time. My first step is to tighten up the plot. So far, I haven't cut much but have re-arranged the happenings in the story to make it tighter. Chapter by chapter, not even halfway through, I'm making satisfactory progress.

To cut the fat is one of the self-editing steps, but I'm not there yet. It's interesting that "lean" is also the word for writing. In our meals, we watch out for the saturation fat, and in our writing we do the same. Happily, I haven't come across this kind of bad stuff in all the chapters I've revised. Maybe because when I write, I keep in mind: "Keep it lean and thin like myself." For some people, I'm bony. So, if my writing gets too lean, I can add some meat to it, but no fat.

While talking about self-editing, a book comes to mind. Edit Yourself: A Manual for Everyone Who Works with Words by Bruce Ross-Larson. I'll refer to it when I clean up the words and sentence structure. It'll be a while before I take that step.