
This lecture sets out the basic goals of editing in terms of making sure our writing points to the fictive world, rather than the words, and describes the content of the entire course.
Magic Typos and Getting Tense reviews the 12 tenses in English and provides examples of how they do and don’t work.
The Vile Beast Redundancy and its Sidekick Overuse reviews how to recognize and correct word overuse and the three types of redundancy; core, conceptual and contextual.
Story describes how the same dynamic of tension and release that governs narrative, governs the best way to structure your writing from the micro to the macro level.
Editing Sentences defines the term and applies the editing rules covered in the last section to sentences, to multiple examples.
Editing Paragraphs – defines the term and applies the editing rules covered in the last section to paragraphs, to multiple examples.
Editing Scenes defines the term and applies the editing rules covered in the last section to scenes, to multiple examples.
Editing the Rich and Famous reviews each element of the course by applying the rules to some passages by famous authors
99% of writing is rewriting. So, if you’re a writer, unless you’re somehow magically able to set down one brilliant pristine passage after another, you will spend a lot of time rewriting. Some rewriting uses the same creative process that got you there in the first place; adding and/or substantially changing ideas, characters, locations and plot points, which I’ll refer to here as revising the content.
This course isn’t about that, it’s about the other, let’s say 48.5%; editing, taking a hard, unflinching look at what you’ve already got. And that’s not just about correcting typos or other mistakes, otherwise known as proofreading. Editing involves cutting, restructuring, streamlining, and otherwise honing that beautiful muse-inspired mess, so it becomes the best possible version of itself, ready for readers to enjoy, or for a professional editor to rip into all over again while you stand by, whimpering. This course shows you how to do that in eight handy-dandy lectures:
1. Introduction.
2. Magic Typos and Getting Tense. If you’re an expert proofreader and/or grammarian, feel free to skip this one. If not, don’t, especially if you’ve always wondered what future perfect continuous means.
3. The Vile Beast Redundancy and its Sidekick Overuse – Redundancy in all its forms being the biggest impediment to good writing, second only to an unhealthy attachment to our work.
4. Story describes how the same dynamic of tension and release that governs narrative, governs the best way to structure the subjects of the next three lectures, sentences, paragraphs and scenes.
5. Editing Sentences
6. Editing Paragraphs
7. Editing Scenes
From there, but way of review, I dare to take a look at some passages from the works of famous authors and yes, for better or worse, edit them, in:
8. Editing the Rich and Famous
No additional software or equipment required.