Write Fast, Edit Slow

This article isn’t so much about a writing tip as it is about how I do things. For some people, that will constitute a tip, but I am well aware that this particular approach is not gospel, and others have different methods that are successful for them. That is for them to write. For me, I live by the dictum: Write fast, edit slow.

Again: write fast, edit slow.

When I write, it is usually after a time of contemplation. I’ve thought over the various plot ideas, who the characters are, and have a general sense of where everything is headed before I put a single keystroke into my word processor. Of course, there are some exceptions to this. Perhaps a better dictum would be: Follow no rule, but especially not one of your own. For I have written entire novel-length works off the cuff, not knowing where the characters will take me or where it will end. But in general, these works have not been as good (as evidenced by the fact that none of those novel attempts are even being revised at the moment, let alone anywhere approaching the neighborhood of being “publishable”).

One of the benefits to having all your ducks in a row before you begin is that it makes it very easy to get going. When you know where the end is, even when there are a few surprises that pop up here and there (after all, sometimes your characters will contradict your plans), the goal is always present. You’re never lost. You have a destination.

So this enables me to write fast. In fact, I tend to write in bursts, miniature explosions of creativity—like my own personal literary Big Bangs. And, to press that metaphor a bit further, just like with the universe, after a period of rapid initial inflation, there are billions of years of slow editing as things cool down and solidify into reality. Only for writing, it merely feels like billions of years of work.

To use another image, this time from the realm of sculptures, writing to me is finding the borders and the outline of what I want to create. And to now mix everything in a rule-breaking faux pas: when I write fiction, at the end of the first draft I want someone to be able to look at it and say, “Ah, yes, I see you are making a horse, because I can see four legs, a mane, and even a saddle.”

But the process of editing is different. It’s the laborious exercise of love. It’s polishing the statute so the horse looks like it needs to be in a pasture grazing instead of decorating your living room.

No one publishes a first draft, because there’s no such thing as good writing. There is only good editing.

So why not mix these? Why write fast before editing slow? I have seen many writers get stuck trying to get the perfect first chapter and their novel never gets off the ground. Their first chapter is brilliant! But they have no finished work. In the end, I suppose we’d all rather have an unpolished statue that looks vaguely horse-like than a realistic horse-head stuck on a block of marble.

So when writing, it is best to turn off edit mode. Let it all spill forth in all its beautiful chaos! No one publishes a first draft, because there’s no such thing as good writing. There is only good editing. And since you will be spending far more of your time editing than you will be creating, it makes sense to me that “write fast, edit slow” will be the best use of time and energy resources.