While I'm still on the subject of rewriting (as I had suspected, Prospective Agent is snowed under after the Frankfurt Book Fair and has asked for a fortnight's grace before I send TB&TW off to him) I thought I'd address the issue of the far-from-paperless process as it occurs in my house.
Though I try and do as much rewriting/editing as I can onscreen, there is a completely different feel about the printed page and I know that no part of my book is properly combed-through and appraised until I've done it on the page. Consequently, I have piles and piles of A4 printouts of various bits and drafts of The Black and The White hanging about the place. As of yesterday I decided to chuck them all in the recycling bin and just keep the most recent, clean copy.
What does everybody else do with printed-out drafts?
14 comments:
Yeah, recycling bin. Although before I moved house this time around I always kept them all. It was a very pile of paper when it finally went to the wheelie bin in the sky.
So moving house does have its advantages then...
Stack them for a while. Recycle them when I realize that I no longer know which draft is which.
I have a rather large collection of manuscripts of other people's drafts of their books, though, and I can't bear to part with most of those. If nothing else, they may be useful to future scholars.
Or for blackmail.
PS I also need to see it on paper because it reads in a different fashion.
On occasion, I've used Lulu's free software to print a chapter as if typeset. Now that really changes how one reads it!
I don't print stuff out for mymself, but I still have the printed version of Birds and Bees sent to me by Macmillan for editing. I use the reverse side to print off odd things from the internet, and also for scrap paper. But it will keep me in scrap paper for a very long time, and if there's ever another one, I think I'll recycle it straight away. the pile never seems to get any smaller.
HI David - yes, having something typeset as a book does make it read differently. Sometimes I print mine out in Word's reading mode for that reason.
As for posterity - do you know really famous (or potentially famous) people?
Hi Frances - yes, the scrap paper scenario. How much scrap paper can any one household use up? Certainly not a draft's worth every few months, that's for sure...
I always print and mark, and then once I'm done I throw the heap into recycling bin and cart it away ASAP. I love revising, but it's great to have it behind me, too.
That said, I've recently gotten my hands' on a couple of authors' Lulu early drafts and proofs and it's kind of a cool collectible for me, so I might do something like that in the future.
Hi Nevets - I find it interesting that people are using Lulu to produce book-like drafts. Who said technology would be the death of the book?!
Alis - I can't get the link to your website (top left) to open from your blog home page.
Sure, I know famous or potentially famous people. Many of those don't send me manuscripts, of course. Usually only the writers do that.
I have two ms from other MNW writers (works that are so-far unpublished); presubmission drafts from two different writers whose first novels just came out; some manuscripts that now have agents out peddling them; and big chunks of works-in-progress by various folks, one of which I am certain will be published (if she ever stops tweaking and finishes the damned thing).
With that many to choose form, I'm sure somebody will hit the jackpot.
Hi Catherine - thanks for reminding me! I need to take that link down as I've shut the website down for now. My host was quite expensive and I want to put a new site together with a new host, which I will do once I have some firm movement on the next book. Meanwhile, it's an expense I can do without.
With that many irons in the fire, David, you should be running a critique-ing service!
I like reading.
There's a special sizzle when you're reading something before anyone else has seen it.
Or maybe that's just me?
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