Writing for a Living: Editing Your Own Work

1. WFL Editing 1: Introduction: Hello and welcome to writing for a living, editing your own work. I'm Stefan be trigger, adjunct professor at the University of Massachusetts, and author of over 20 novels and hundreds of graphic novels. Having been a writer for a long, long time. Now, I want to pass the blessing and the curse on to you with courses like this one, writing for living the query and writing comics. There are a lot of old adages about writing out there. Very few of which I found to be true, right? What you know, for instance, really isn't very useful advice. If we only wrote what we knew, how would we ever learned anything? Writing if nothing else is about discovery, exploring the world and the self, either in search of new territory or ways to make what we thought was familiar, feel new, right? What you'd like to know is probably more on the mark. Kill your darlings. If an adorable, pithy bit of prose gets in the way of what you're trying to accomplish. Sure, kill it. But if it isn't the way isn't really a darling. After all. On the other hand, show don't tell is definitely absolutely, totally positively true. But more on that later, which brings us to 99% of writing is rewriting, which is also true. Notice that leaves 1% for creating living in the first place, which will be the subject of another course. If you're a writer, unless you're magically able to set down one brilliant pristine passage after another, you will spend a lot of time rewriting. The summary writing uses the same creative process that got you there in the first place. Adding under substantially changing ideas, characters, locations, and plot points, which I'll refer to here as revising the content for 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 music inspired mess. So it becomes the best possible version of itself, ready for readers to enjoy or for a professional editor to rip into it all over again while you standby whimpering. Now many professionals refer to this process as line editing. But that's a deceptive term. What I'm talking about involves everything from sentences to paragraphs, to scenes to Chapters. Something of that 1%, or rather the 49.5% as creative and the rest as self-conscious in a way antithetical to creativity. They are fundamentally different. But in real life, there's a lot of overlap, at least for the first draft or so no writer ever just edits. In fact, whenever you have a great creative notion that will improve your content, you should stop editing and go for it. And delightfully, obviously that should be an irritating if you have that great idea moments after you thought you're finally finished, let's call it writing tip number 1. Along those lines. While a strict order may be necessary for assembling a car, for defusing a bomb. When it comes to writing, a slave owner, Thomas Jefferson said, a foolish consistency is the hob goblin of small minds. Making write what you know, hob goblin number 1, and kill your darlings. Goblin number two. Big picture, the order doesn't matter. Some writers, editors, they go along reworking the first sentence over and over. Others joyfully scribble nonsense for a hundreds of pages. It doesn't matter. Your personal point of entry is arbitrary. The only thing that counts is the final product, giving us writing tip number 2, whatever works, works and it's corollary, writing tip number 3, if it works, do more of it. If it doesn't do less. So while the nuts and bolts rules and strategies you'll learn here are effective, how and when you use them is really up to you. You do you. That said much as following the Muses blissed, the Muse doesn't pay your bills. If you are a wanna be a professional with deadlines, then yeah, it is more like assembling a car or defusing a bomb. And while there's no car or explosion involved, the fact is that a structured process will increase your production and make the quality of your writing more reliable. And I do present things in a suggested order. Not just because I have to structure these lectures somehow, but because going step-by-step really does come in handy. The basis for these lectures are some very specific stumbling blocks that over a decade or so, I've seen students, other professional writers and myself run into again and again, the biggest, especially for beginners as ourselves, before having our souls crushed by the publishing industry and, or the rest of the cruel world. We writers tend to get very attached to our work. Many of us think of and actually refer to our work as our baby. And when it comes to harming a single hair and it said, who would hurt a baby? Only writing tip number 4, writing isn't a baby, nor is it in itself by any means a living thing that can be hurt or killed. To paraphrase Bruce Springsteen, it's a brilliant disguise. A bunch of lines that form letters, letters that form words, word sentences, sentences, paragraphs, and so on. At each level, micro to macro discrete pieces, by which I mean individual and arguably separate parts create a hole. Greater than the sum of those parts. Not just great, really great, so great in fact, that when all those bits and pieces are put together the right way, they can make us respond emotionally, intellectually, even physically, to a fake world as if it exists. Like when a thriller or romance gets your heart thumping. And that includes nonfiction, which likewise don't maybe surprising to some, is also writing tip number 5 not alive, nor is it in any sense objective reality. As with any pros in the end, it's still a bunch of agreed upon squiggles presented through an author's sundry choices, biases and filter. Unlike babies, disguises can be cut up, rearranged, improved, repurpose, and even outright abandon without violating any instinct, ethic, or legality. Not that the detachment comes easily. We put our heart and soul into our writing only. Again, not really, since I assume the heart remains in her chest and the soul being eternal indoors wherever such things in Georgia. Which brings us to writing tip number 6, if you're worried, keep an extra copy of your work. You can always wail away at that copy of your child. I mean, manuscript while the original stays pristine, safe and warm because also unlike a child writing tip number 7, anything you change can always be changed back. In other words, when and if you do kill your reform mentioned darlings. You're not actually killing anything. You're not even losing anything. Whatever other magic may ensue. The goal of writing them like any art, is to produce a deception. Ally, I say this pretty much every class, so it's practically a catchphrase. But this isn't a pipe. It's the word pipe. This isn't a pipe either. It's a picture of a pipe. How can you tell? Because you can't put tobacco in it and smoke it? Most start then strives to hide the fact that it's art. Even if it's abstract or about art. This says it's not a pipe, but it's really not saying anything. You're reading words. Even in fourth wall breaking metacommentary, the commentary itself is still an artifice. When Deadpool talks about the story he's in, He's not really talking. He's either a drawing or an actor. Because, you know, DevTools not real. When everything's working as it should though, you don't see the letters or the words. You hear his voice. You don't see the brush strokes are the pixels. You see a pipe that doesn't exist, which is exactly what writers and readers want from each other. Not to experience lines on a page, but to engage a fictive world. It follows then that anything reminding them that they're looking at words, runes, the brilliant disguise in terms of the creation of content that 1% of the process mentioned earlier, overused tropes, stereotypical characters, and familiar plot points and so on don't work because they're artifice is too apparent. Of editing. Things like bad grammar, pore structure, and needless repetition can rip the mask off before the reader even gets to the content. So long story, short and there is a point to all this. The goal of editing is writing tip number 8 to make sure that everything points to the world, not the words. In this course, we'll show you how to do that in a handy-dandy lecture. Lecture 1, this introduction which you're watching now. Lecture 2, magic typos and getting tense. If you're an expert proofreader, enter a grammarian. Feel free to skip this one. If not, don't. Especially if you've always wondered what future perfect continuous means. Lecture 3, the vial beast redundancy and it's sidekick overuse redundancy in all its forms. Being the biggest impediment to good writing. Second only to an unhealthy attachment to our work. Lecture 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. Lecture 5, editing sentences, Lecture 6, Editing paragraphs, and Lecture 7, editing scenes from there. By 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 lecture 8. Editing the rich and famous. That's all I've got for the introduction. See you next lecture. Some info that data. And sometimes I lay down and just test in the middle of occasional passes down and somebody is holding me. And if I'm drought and in my albedo, we'll have to do because I really hate to sound for an hour and sometimes I've run around and around, maybe scream in my head off or I won't even make them stick into the bladder. Scan and all that. Just sit and wait and formats you drop brand next to you. As the best that I could do. Last day of the bar is where no one else can see mono, whether to follow me. I do. F of 0 is the model and I'll swim against the stream of you with three and at t o dream and the dream of me, you know, I really need to chew. 2. WFL Editing 2: Typos & Tense: Lecture 2, magic typos and getting tense as the title not only suggests, but outright States, This lecture covers typos intense, the latter being a subject. So I may react to by saying, hey, I already know that stuff or I know it's right when I see it or I can't even bring myself to care. If you were born in an English-speaking country or otherwise proficient in the language, no doubt you have a pretty strong grasp of tense. Yet it comes up so often and undergrad writing, something's going on. And I'm pretty sure it's not the fall of Western civilization. Thing is, when it comes to editing your own work, something you've presumably already spent a lot of time with writing tip number nine. It's not necessarily what you know so much as how long you can pay attention to rearranging scenes across dozens or hundreds of pages, exactly the sort of playing around writers should be doing. You may put a phrase in one voice here and mix it with another. Their second nature though it may feel these are some of the things that even if you do know by heart, you should watch out for while editing. Mistakes are unavoidable. Typo squatters rely on them registering domain names that slightly misspell a highly popular names, like goggle for Google to attract traffic. It's so effective. Major corporations invest a lot of money in shutting them down. When it comes to prose, even after being read and re-read by friends, editors, and professional proofreaders. Even with spellcheck and grammarly, it's stunningly common for an author to crack open a shiny new copy of their book. Inhale that wonderful new book smell, randomly flip to a page and immediately spot a typo. Many writers and editors will back me up on this. Sometimes it's the only one in the whole book. I don't know how it works, I don't know why. And it frightens me. Which brings us to another difference between revising content and editing. When you're engaging amuse, the act of reading itself makes it hard to proofread. The more effective the content, the more alluring the fictive world, the harder it can be to spot minor errors, making it wildly easy for the rider to miss the tree for the forest. These days, I try very hard to think of editing is completely different. More like a crossword puzzle. Where rather than trying to find the best thing to say, the only goal is to find the best way to say it. An attitude that can help put the focus back on the words, which brings us to writing tip number ten. Don't edit like you're creating a world at it, like you're doing a crossword puzzle. I heard a story once about a high school English teacher who had a unique idea for how to reliably proof his first novel. He gave it to his students and told them we'd pay a nickel for every type of they could find. And they found a lot. After making the corrections. He offered his next class but dime, and they found not as many, but more typo. Then he offered a quarter and so on. By the time he reached five bucks, a typo, we wound up with a pretty clean manuscript, writing tip number 11, even if it's a given that you won't catch them all. When it comes to typos, do the best you can. I'm not by any means a strict grammarian. I know that when someone asks How you doing the proper English response isn't I'm doing good. I'm doing well. But as my wife will assure you, I don't care. As Winston Churchill said when chastised for ending a sentence with a preposition, this is the type of Errand pet entry up with which I will not put. The goal is communication. If a stranglehold attitude toward grammar gets in the way of expressing character or ideas. It can become hob goblin number 3. Also, grammar can get classes to very quickly. But that's another subject that said, I do have terrific respect for those who study, understand, and appreciate the beauty of linguistic structures. And whether someone understands you or not does depend a lot on who you're trying to talk to or to whom you're trying to talk. I do believe wholeheartedly that consistency is essential. And if you're going to switch things up, you should have a good reason. One that will enhance your work, not detract from it. Having been writing so much for so long. When it comes to proper grammar, I tend to trust my intuition. My wax on wax off bone memory rather than a conscious recall of each tense by name. If it sounds right, no artificial intelligence is flagging it. I'm good to go. I want to be clear about one thing though. If autocorrect gives you a word, phrase grammar correction, that kind of sounds right? But you're not sure what it is and you use it. That's not a typo. That's an abdication of effort. That's you not bothering to look something up for the sake of this lecture though. And so I could avoid using phrases like that thing when describing errors. I went back and read about the 12 basic English tenses, which I will now review. For starters, tenses place us in time or relationship. That gives us three choices, no more, no less past, present, or future. In English, each tense has four aspects. Simple, meaning a statement of fact or a complete action. Continuous or progressive. Meaning an incomplete action. Perfect, meaning an action that's complete but subject to change. And the biggest pain, perfect continuous or perfect progressive and ongoing action relative to its duration or the occurrence of another action. Or something like that anyway. And here's a chart of all of them. An example of a sentence using simple past would be blurry, robbed the bank. Past perfect, also known as pluperfect, would be Blair had robbed the bank. It's used to imply that something related happened shortly after the action completed, as in Blair had robbed the bank when the police arrived past continuous would be Blair was robbing the bank, meaning the bank has yet to be completely 3-OPT, we're in process. It also implies something related occurred during the action, as in Blair was robbing the bank when the police arrived. In past, perfect, it's a done deal. The bank had already been robbed when the police arrived. And past continuous Blair's not finished when the police arrive. So far, so good. But then you've got past perfect continuous. If you've been paying attention, that should seem like a contradiction. Since if it's perfect is a completed action. But if it's continuous, it's incomplete. In practice, when you combine the two, you get an action that was continuous. But now it's done, as in Blair had been robbing the bank when the police arrived. So what's the difference between Blair had been robbing the bank when the police arrived and Blair was robbing the bank when the police arrived. Past continuous robbing means Blair was still robbing the bank. While past perfect continuous had been robbing means Blair wasn't finished, but he stopped when the police showed up. In practice, we tend to misunderstand and misuse poor past, perfect continuous. This is probably because a 99% of the time doesn't matter. And B, there are many other ways to say the same thing that would be clearer and more engaging for those who don't particularly understand or care about the tense. A bit off topic. But notice how the content sets up a tension, robbing a bank, tensing itself, then the police show up. That's the heart of narrative or story. It's embedded in how we think and key to writing and editing, which we'll look at more next lecture. Moving on, simple present indicates either recurrent action. Blair rubs the bank, Meaning that Blair is doing it right now. Or a statement of fact. Layer robs banks. It's what Blair does. Blair is robbing the bank would be present continuous because Blair's not done yet. Present perfect would be Blair has robbed the bank. Now Blair's done that darn bank has been robbed. Kudos to those of you who noticed that present perfect. Blair has robbed the bank, means pretty much the same as simple past. Blair rob the bank. There is a very slight difference that being the relative timing present perfect is used for recent events. Blair may have robbed the bank two years ago, but Blair has robbed the bank just now for really nine times out of 10 in the context of a narrative, the distinction is moved. Here's a mouthful. Present perfect continuous, which denotes something that started in the past but continues in the present. Blair has been robbing the bank and is usually used to express a specific duration for the continuous action. Blair has been robbing the bank for an hour. It takes Blair two hours to rob a bank, on the other hand, would be simple present. Since it states a current fact, as in right now, it's true that it takes Blair two hours to run a bank. Following the same rules. Simple future would be layer will rob the bank. Future continuous. Blair will be robbing the bank. Future perfect. Blair will have robbed the bank, as in, by the time the cops arrive, layer will have robbed the bank. And finally, future perfect continuous, which refers to what a current ongoing action will be doing in the future. By December, Blair will have been robbing banks for five years. Gop, layer go. And there you have it. The 12th English tenses. As I've already suggested by my tone and lax, if not smug attitude, due to usage and contexts, some of these tensors are very much very often optional. More to the point, it may seem like a contradiction, but the intended clarity of an uncommon tense can actually work against the clarity of the passage if the reader misinterprets it, if it stops or slows them down, makes them say, ha, even for a moment, even though it may well be more precise, It's still points to the words, not the world. For instance, I've yet to see an example where simple past can't be used in place of past perfect. In the context of a narrative will very likely know if Blair robbed the bank just now. In which case, we were shocked to learn that Blair had robbed. The bank, is effectively the same as we were shocked to learn that Blair robbed the bank. Likewise, when it comes to past perfect continuous versus past continuous, rarely, rarely will the distinction between Blair had been robbing the bank and Blair was robbing the bank be an issue. Even in those rare circumstances, there are dozens of other usually much more engaging ways you can get across the idea that Blair was or wasn't finished with robbing the bank. By, for instance, showing, rather than telling, the last tumbler of the lock click into place when the door burst open and the police rushed in writing tip number 12. When it comes to tensors, unless you have a solid reason to use has, have had, stick to what's most direct. Keep it simple, keep it easy, keep it consistent. The more moving parts you introduced, the more things can break. Now let's look at some examples of what not to do cold from the actual work of my students, but modified to protect the innocent. The first few are subject to what I call tense drift. But he knew who the killer is. No being simple past tense is being simple present. It should be one or the other. But he knows who the killer is or, but he knew who the killer was. Next up as CD traced the steps of Jesus through the streets. She inevitably gets lost and finds herself in a shop filled to the brim with beautiful antiquities of unknown origin. A little tougher to spot, but this again mixes simple past and present to keep it consistently in simple past, it would be a CV traced the steps of Jesus through the streets. She inevitably got lost and found herself in a shop filled to the brim with beautiful antiquities of unknown origin. To put it entirely in simple present tense, as city traces the steps of Jesus through the streets, she inevitably gets lost and finds herself in a shop filled to the brim with beautiful antiquities of unknown origin. This was a little more complicated. I wanted it to be on TV, travel, giving great talks, inspire kids, and write books. It starts in the simple past, wanted, then moves to the simple present travel. That shift is fine. Since wanted refers to a past desire for a present condition. As in I used to in the past, wanna be a doctor in the present. But then it shifts to the continuous giving before going back to the simple present with Inspire and right. Given the simple past wanted, using either as a second tensor is fine, but not both. I wanted to be on TV, travel, give great talks, inspire kids and write books. Or I wanted it to be on TV, traveling, giving great talks, inspiring kids, and reading books. So far we've been looking at incorrect usage. Now let's look at some examples where the tense choice is arguably optional. Sirens scream in lights flare, people are yelling. He opens his eyes but only sees the past. Flash buys if he's in a dream. So over the course of three sentences, the tense moves from the simple present, scream and flair to present continuous yelling. Then back to the simple present opens, sees, flash. And the is, that's part of the contraction. He. Since the shift happens in different sentences, and we were made in a form of the present tense. Technically, there may be no grammatical error, but even so, consistency makes for a smoother read. Sirens scream and lights flare, people yell. He opens his eyes, but only sees the past flash by as if he's in a dream. Next. On the night of their anniversary. Amy has disappeared without a trace. While has disappeared is a perfectly correct use of the present perfect. The sense would have a more direct impact by eliminating has and putting it in the simple past. On the night of their anniversary, Amy disappeared without a trace. Disappeared. Has disappeared. Yes, it is just three letters. But even that separating us ever so slightly from the disappearance can have an impact. There are also situations in which you might want the reader to consider your use of tense. As in this interesting example, he remembers how warm the fresh blood was when it hit his foot from his blade. Is former Lord motionless lies before him as he contemplates taking his own life for portraying his master. Here are the tense doesn't change from the first sentence to the second. Both or in simple present. Thanks to the use of remembers, but also thanks to the use of remembers. The time does change. Taking us from the present experience of a memory into the memory itself, as if it were taking place in the present. The way the character originally experienced it, based on context and style. It could be a jarring shift or an enticing segue. The last one I want to look at is more complex and particularly interesting because here are the student writer is emulating Cormac McCarthy, who sometimes plays with tens and a poetic manner. We will all meet our maker in time. The sun has set, the night is calm. He ran on. In one sentence, it moves from simple future, will all to pass. Perfect has set, has come to simple past. He ran. The ambiguity, demands some interpretation to make sense of the passage. If we assume that in time refers to the first three phrases, putting them all in simple future at least seems to add clarity with he ran on then referring to a character continuing to run. Because of his awareness that all things including himself and we will all meet our maker in time. The sun will set, the night will come. He ran on. Adding a period also helps. We will all meet our maker. In time. The sun will set, the night will come. He ran on. But if in time only refers to the first phrase. The other two are more directly to the immediate circumstances of the subject. He. It might make more sense to put all of those in simple past like this. We will all meet our maker in time. The sunset, the night calm. He ran on, as we'll see in the electron sentences. One neat thing about sentence clauses is that you can flip them and see what works best. As in, in time, we will all meet our maker. The sunset, the night come. He ran on, which I think makes the most sense. Experimentation like this can lead to great things. So writing tip Number 13, when you're drafting, if you feel like doing something, do it, whatever it is. You can always fix it and editing. But there's a corollary writing tip Number 14. When editing, clarity comes first. If you don't have a specific reason for doing something in a less than symbol way simplified. I'm not saying what that reason has to be. It could be a question of rhythm or whatever, but if you don't know why it's there, make it consistent or cut it out. As Laurie Anderson via William Burroughs said, language is a virus from outer space. And it's better to hear your name then to see your face. See you next lecture. Sometimes the demo and sometimes I lay down and die. Sometimes we'll just test in the middle of occasional passers-by. If I'm down and now somebody is holding me. If I'm drought in, in albedo, we'll have to do. Because I really hate to sound. Lauren. Sometimes I've run around and around, maybe scream in my head off or I won't even make because I'm staking into the bottom scam and I'll sit and wait and formats you drop brand next to you as the best that I could do. Santa Barbara, where no one else can see. Mono, where that to be. I do app flow, model, Enter. I'll swim against the stream of you with three, add it D or dream and the dream of me. You know, I really need to chew on. 3. WFL Editing 3: Redundancy & Overuse: Lecture 3, the vial beast redundancy and it's psychic overuse will come in being venue. Welcome, I am your host. In this lecture, I take a close look at what I think is the single biggest stumbling block for writers, beginners and all hands alike, which uses, you may have guessed from the title redundancy. If you've seen my query and writing comics classes, some of this will be ironically end or appropriately redundant. But here I go into much more depth with more examples pro and con. The Macmillan online dictionary defines redundancy as a situation in which something is not needed, especially because the same thing or a similar thing already exists. In terms of logic and rhetoric, It's often called a tautology in linguistics, a pleonasm. When it comes to editing your own work, it boils down to, as the definition says, needless repetition with the accent on needless. Revising my own work, editing the work of others, working with students, even reading published books or watching television. I see it again and again and again and again. I'm serious, totally serious, absolutely, totally serious. See what I did. Was it really necessary for me to say again four times in the following sentence? Absolutely and totally are not only synonyms, they're not needed at all. Two words, I'm series would have sufficed for that matter. Why say it at all? Don't you assume I'm series. As a talking head, say in psycho killer, say something once. Why say it again? How important is this? Well, when most editors want to cut something down for space, they tend to think in terms of content, a scene here, in event, a character, lines of dialogue. I've surprised many of them by being able to cut manuscripts by as much as a third, just by getting rid of the redundancy. What's wrong with it? Some of you may not have even noticed it if I hadn't pointed it out. But as with typos, awkward tenses, and everything else covered in this course, it points at the words, not the world, dispelling writings Grand Illusion, quick is lightening in the colleague night. Problem being for most of us, repetition comes naturally as we write. We're often searching for just the right word or phrase. If more than one comes to mind in the heat of a creative rush, we tend to put them all down to avoid interrupting our flow and to keep our options open for the best possible choice. Depending on the type of information being repeated in the way it's repeated, it operates on different levels, some of which can be tough to spot to understand each level and include some things you may not even have thought of as redundant. I break it down into three categories, using alliteration for easy memorization. Core redundancy, conceptual redundancy, and contextual redundancy. No doubt Others have come up with similar concepts, but I've never seen them broken down quite this way. So I'm happy to take credit for it. We begin with core redundancy. Redundancy is the one we most commonly think of as redundant. It's simply repeating the same word as in the Department of redundancy department, which I once thought was from Monty Python, but it's actually from fireside theaters. Third album released in 1970, don't crush that dwarf. Hand me the blinders. The Department of redundancy department is not only obvious and operates on more than one level. Making fun of not just the concept of redundancy, but of the redundant departments found in many bureaucracy. So rather than needless repetition per se, It's funny, even illuminating, pointing to the words with a playful purpose in mind. Which brings me to a major point. Yes, redundancy can be useful. Among other reasons, repetition. There may be times when you want to remind the reader of something, but more on that later. Meanwhile, some clearly needless repetition would be the small cat with small, the big dog was big, long or tall, was large. These are simple enough but easy to confuse with a similar but also important editing issue. Overuse while using the same word or phrase over and over can have the same effect as a core redundancy. While the word itself is repeated, the information it conveys isn't repetitive. For instance, the small cat with small is a core redundancy since yes, we get it. The freaking cat is small and telling us twice doesn't convey anything. No. This sentence, even though it uses the word small, twice as often, isn't redundant. The cat was small, the dog was small, the tree was small, and the house was small. But telling us the cat was small provides different information than telling us the dog was small. But certainly by the time you get to the tree in the house, it over uses the word small, a faster, more efficient per perhaps less rhythmic way of saying the same thing would be the cat, the dog, the tree, and the house were small. And now at least the readers more likely to be thinking about the size of the cat, dog tree in house rather than the word small. And that's a single unlikely sentence. But overuse can and usually does take place across multiple sentences, paragraphs, pages, and chapters. Blair book the gun and a gunshot. They learned to use the gun and a gun range. They cleaned to the gun carefully. Blair brought the gun to the bank, where people were freed with the gun and give them money to put the gun away. Synonyms can help. But something like the cat was small, the dog was tiny, the tree was slate in the house was, we can have the same effect depending on the context and the verbiage between US. And to be clear, it's not just about adjectives describing body languages to convey meaning during conversations can exhaust a writer vocabulary pretty quickly. I, for instance, in font of the word shrugged and have to watch out for it across a 110 thousand word book. Overuse can be difficult to weed out, but still do damage. A particular word or phrase that may have been perfect the first time can quickly become tedious for the reader. And George RR Martin drove me crazy because his horses kept recurring. It was a cool evocative word in the first few times. But once I noticed that I couldn't unsee it and wound up for better or worse, sticking to the TV series. In the end, worse. Even beloved catchphrases can wear thin when it comes to keeping track, there are two solutions. The basic answer is writing tip Number 15. Keep a list of suspect words and phrases in a separate document. And when you're editing, enter each into your word processor search. That'll not only find them, it'll count how many times the term has been used. For instance, here I've searched for shrug and something I've been working on recently and wound up with eight results. You might think that's not too bad across a 100 pages, but it can still stick out. The second option is to find what's called a word frequency calculator, an app or website which counts how often phrases appear. But they have their own issues. They're not as easy to find as you'd think, often involve pasting your entire novel into the counter. They can be pricey and unless you customize them carefully, tend to catch a lot of words we have to use repeatedly, like v and so on. I've yet to find when I'd recommend. If you do, please let me know. To get back to our main subject. Redundancy isn't just about repeating words, It's also about repeating ideas. The tiny cat was WE is an overuse, but it is redundancy specifically belonging to our second category, conceptual redundancy. While core redundancies involve identical words or phrases in a conceptual redundancy, the repeated information uses different words, making it a tad harder to spot. If it's a short as two words, It's also called a pleonasm. Common examples being a black darkness or a burning fire. Darkness being black, fire being something that burns. So the redundant and the two-word form, they're fairly well-known and many delightful lists of commonly used conceptual redundancies can be found online. A few examples include a breakthrough. A breakthrough is major. Past history. History is all in the past, gathered together to gather is to bring together advanced warning. If it's not given an advanced, it's not a warning. Bold headed. If you describe someone as bulb, you are ready referring to their head. But note that something like this from Laurie Anderson's Sharpies day isn't redundant since coming up. Like a big ball. Because here the sun only resembles the head, not the whole boulders. The sun coming up like a big bold guy would just be weird. Atm machine is particularly interesting because it's doubly redundant. Since ATM stands for automated teller machine, the phrase itself literally means automated teller machine. Machine. But wait, there's more automated means done by machine. So its full meaning is machine, teller. Machine. Machine or less redundant phrase would be automated teller, but it's far too late to fix that now. And society, as we know it is doomed. Then there's the sort that ignores the binary true, false aspect of certain words like these to actual fact. If it's actual, it is a fact absolutely essential. If it's essential, it's already absolutely essential. Fact, not fact, essential, non-essential. Those are the only choices because the concepts themselves are either or binary. For that matter, unless it's clear the concept isn't binary. After all, you can be a little hungry, fairly hungry, and absolutely hungry. Absolutely is usually redundant as an absolutely true, absolutely pregnant or absolutely alive. In other cases, it's not so much that the words repeat the exact same idea, but their meanings overlap with one concept inherent in or a subgroup of the other. For instance, cease and desist. Cease means to stop. The cis means to stop too, but it also means to refrain, to not do it again in the future. So this means stop, stop and don't do it again. You can cease in the moment, but you can't desist without ceasing collaborate in groups. Arguably, you can be in a group that isn't collaborating. A group can get lost, for example, but if you are collaborating, you're definitely in a group. Here's a fairly obvious one we all use fall down. Think about it. Can't fall up canyon. The direction is inherent in a fall. A big reason conceptual redundancies are tougher to spot is because they're used so often, like fall down, they feel natural. Even some of these two-word example sound more like a way of emphasizing something rather than repeating it to cease and desist sounds more important than just ceasing or disgusting. But it's not like overuse conceptual redundancies, but can also occur across sensors, paragraphs, scenes in Chapters. Tears flowed freely from Martin's eyes. He was crying. Why is that redundant? We already know Martin's crying because of the tiers or the dog pushed it to lakes hard, moved as fast as it could. It was running. If the dog is pushing its legs hard, moving as fast as it can. Of course, it's running. That's what running is. Pam open the front door and stepped in. She entered her home. If she stepped in through her front door, She's already entered her home. These examples I hope are obvious, intended to get the idea across clearly. In practice, the more spread out the repeated information is, the more it's placed in the context of other ideas, the harder it is denoted. Tiers float freely from Martin's eyes. He stumbled about the room trying to gather his thoughts but could not. He was crying. In particular, I've seen many beginning writers have their characters enter the same place more than once, eager to get to sleep. Pam fisher key from the pocket and lock the front door, turned the knob, pushed it open in, stepped in. After a long, brutal day, at long last, she entered her home, perhaps tougher to spot, but the fact is she's still entering her home twice with conceptual redundancies. At least we're still dealing exclusively with words. That's not always true of our final category, contextual redundancy. With a contextual redundancy, the repetition occurs because the information conveyed by the words has already been made clear by the context. A common example would be an email that begins, I'm writing to you today. If you're writing to someone, of course, your writing. And when else would you be writing? If not on the day that you were writing, even if you could time travel, you'd still be writing on what is to you today. This is particularly important when it comes to pitches, summaries, or query letters were spaces at a premium. For example, if you're contacting an editor or agent about your novel contexts already tells them at least three things. One, that you're writing to, that you're writing about some creative work. And three, that the creative work is yours. Yet I often see queries written by my students that open with phrases like, I'm writing to tell you about my fiction story, which tells the tale. How much of that should you keep? None. It's all apparent from the context. Points to the words, not the content you're trying to get across and takes up valuable space that could be used for that content. By the way, this example also contains two conceptual redundancies. Can you spot them? A little bit of times up? A story is by definition fiction, that of course tells a tale. Tale being synonymous with story. Editors and agents are practicing ignoring fluff. So they'll likely skim over something like I'm writing to you today and queries in pitches. Then the main goal of eliminating contextual redundancy is to save space in prose. Since the context is being described by the words in the first place, it can be more apparent. And you stepped into the room and announced, here I am. Now Joe, Maybe someone who likes stating the obvious, in which case by all means keep it. If not, don't. I've read similar things in tele plays and detective novel. Joe nodded at the mess. What are you going to do about the car accident? The two cars lay in a steaming, mangled heap as opposed to the more organic. Joe nodded at the mess. What are you going to do about that? The two cars lay in a steaming mangled heap. The first version may not pull the reader out, but the second more effectively reinforces the fictive reality. It creates a question. What's that? With the following sentence providing the answer. Being aware of contractual redundancy, aware of what's implicit in a scene can also go a long way to resolving another very common writing issue, which I'll call the sadness of set. Consider these two sentences. Blair wave at the barrel of the author, PK 380 in the air. I have a gun. He said, similar to our last two examples, assuming everyone can see the PK 380, they're already know Blair has a gun, making his statement contextually redundant. But does it take you out of the world? Now really, that could easily be read as Blair purposefully drawing attention to the gun. But there are two other contextually redundant words here that I've used too often could well end up stopping the reader short. To make them more obvious, Let's expand the passenger bit. Blurred wave at the barrel of the author PK 380 in the air. I have a gun. He said, patellar gasp, you'll never get away with this. He said, blurs mild. I think I will. He said That's right. It he said or she said, are there, which can be easily overused, and it's surprisingly often contextually redundant. Some writers try to mix it up with adverse. Blair waved at the barrel of the water PK 380 in the air. I have a gun. He said frighteningly. The teller gasped, you'll never get away with this. He said fearfully. Blair smiled. I think I will. He said confidently. Notables like Stephen King and I look forward to editing in a later lecture, famously argued that the use of adverbs is itself a way of pointing to the word. If the dialogue and seeing are well-written, midtone should be clear from context. I would never say is king does in on writing that adverbs should never be used, which can be hob goblin number 4. But in this case, as in most, they really don't help. You could also try synonyms, but the effect remains much the same. Blair wave to the barrel of the Walther PK 380 in the air. I have a gun. He snarled. The teller gasped. You'll never get away with this. He declared. Blair smiled. I think I will. He answered. As long as we're here. A side note, I've seen more than a few students put a comma after the speaker's description rather than a period. As in Blair smiled gamma, I have a gun, but that's grammatically and pragmatically incorrect. Writing tip Number 16, you can't smile, laugh, or sidewards. You can only save them. Even if you're smiling, laughing, or sign while you talk. You can still only say the word. Meanwhile, back at the sadness of said here, then very often said in its synonyms are contextually redundant. So here's that passage again, without either Blair wave to the barrel of the author PK 380 in the air. I have a gun. The teller gasped, you'll never get away with this. Blair smiled. I think I will. Contexts makes not only the speaker, but their tone clear. Focusing the reader on what's happening, rather than noticing how many times said is used. Ipso facto abracadabra, the idea that you always have to directly indicate the speaker using some form of said gives us hob goblin number five. On the other hand, sometimes you really do have to indicate the speaker, as in this example, Max and pad IED each other across the table. You're going to finish that. Without more information, we have no idea who's talking. Using a version of set is certainly an easy option. And as long as you only use it when you have two, it's far less than issue. Max and Pat. I'd each other across the table. You going to finish that? Max asked the sense you can always revise the surrounding descriptions. It's never the only option or necessarily the one that most strongly anchors the reader in the moment. Max independent of each other across the table, Max pointed to the remains of the muffin. You going to finish that importantly, unattributed dialogue should immediately follow or proceed. The description of the speaker, either on the same line or on its own line. Placing it elsewhere, muddies things. Max independent of each other across the table, Max pointed to the remains of the muffin. You're going to finish that. Took another bite. Now Max is very likely still a speaker here, but this could be read as max pointing at the muffin for some other reason. But before they can explain, pad interrupts by expressing an interest in Max's food, as in Max and Pat, I'd each other across the table. Max pointed to the muffin. It was inflames. You're going to finish that. Took another bite, then nodded and maxes for eyes. How short is too short? As you get better at noticing and eliminating redundancy, your work will probably get well shorter. And that can be worrisome to someone, say, trying to write a book. How long should a piece of prose be In a perfect world? It's like Lincoln said when asked how long a man's legs should be long enough to reach the ground. Meaning any piece of writing should be long enough to tell its story. No more, no less. In real life from a ten-page paper to a novel that has to be around 80 thousand words to websites and magazines that paid by the word. We're trained to make things or certain length. And there are very good reasons teachers want students data certain page length. And of course, people won't pay the same for a short story that they went for a novel. But having a word count in the back of your head also provides a motive for and reinforces the habit of redundancy. There are ways to expand narratives and you'll see some in upcoming lectures. We're expand the sentence into a paragraph and a paragraph into a scene. But crucially, none of those involved the sort of padding that good editing attempts to eliminate. If you keep something in only for the sake of word count, you're cheating your readers and lowering the quality of your work. And there is always another option. While I fully believe that redundancy in all its forms is a devious obstacle to good writing, like fire, when used intentionally, it can be a powerful tool. For instance, the title of Charles Dickens famous short story, a Christmas Carol is redundant. Why? Because a Carroll is a Christmas song. So a Christmas Carol means a Christmas, Christmas song. But would you really want to change it to just a Carroll? Some uses of redundancy even have their own names like excuses and automaton, Greek for state of noun. It originally referred to a sentence composed only of nouns and adjectives, meaning no verbs. But in Diamond Game demean a way to emphasize an idea by repeating it using synonyms. A popular example is, I didn't get a thing for my birthday, 0, zilch, zippo. Similarly, repeating the same word, a court redundancy can be used for dramatic effect. Spock is dead Jim debt. As a cautionary tale, the line was used so often in the original Star Trek, it became a cliche. Repetition can also be used to enhance a static flow. The rhythms of dialogue for the poetics of a descriptive passage. Take the stance of the bells by Edgar Allan Poe, which repeats bells tinkling time to great effect. Here are the repetition conjures the sound itself. There. The sledges with silver bow. Melody are crystalline delight. And that's all music. God. Rhetoric, the art of persuasion, describes a whole bunch of ways redundancy can be put to good use. And anaphora repeats a word or phrase from the beginning of a sentence, as in Martin Luther King's, I Have a Dream speech. One day, live in a bad character. It's opposite of dystrophy. Repeats the last word or phrase, as in Lincoln's, lead, this nation under God shall have a new birth of freedom. And that government of the people, by the people, for the people shall not perish from the earth. A. Simplest C combines the two with one phrase at the beginning of a sense repeated and another at the end. As in this passage from Malcolm X, market, what are my going up? And then attended classes, repeats a word or phrase, but with a different meaning. You'll see this a lot NADH slogans. An anti stasis is a form of antigenic classes where the repeated term implies the opposite, as with James Thurber. Why do so many people who can't write plays, write plays. A negative, positive restatement, repeats a similar statement first negatively and then in a positive sense, as with John F Kennedy's, what your country can do for you. What you can do for your country. Lastly, a parallel osha repeats a single word for emphasis or rhythm as with 0, horror, horror, horror from Macbeth, or the more serene row, row, row your boat. Now beyond emphasis, rhythm being persuasive and it sounds really nice. Sometimes as I said earlier, European information because you want to remind the reader of something as I did just now where I repeated myself to let you know that we're now returning to a previously mentioned topic. And I hope reassuring you that there's some structure to these lectures. Likewise, in longer works, it can be important to touch back on a plot point, especially if that point was first introduced 20 pages ago. Good thing. I took the bullets out of the gun back in Cincinnati. And conclusion, the point is to use redundancy consciously. In good writing. Redundancy is always a choice, never an abdication of effort. And the only way to do that is to scour your writing for all three forms. If you find a redundancy, you wanna keep, make sure you have a great ironclad reason for doing so. Otherwise, as they say in Apocalypse Now, eliminate them with extreme prejudice. And sometimes I laid down, passes by. Somebody is holding me and had been drought. Sometimes I run around and around the screen and I'm sticking into the job, waiting for me as the best that I could do. No one else can see the momentum. I'll swim against our view with the dream and the dream of me. You know, I really need to do. 4. WFL Editing 4: Story: Lecture 4, story. Since you're watching a course about editing, I assume you already have something you'd like to edit. So to be clear, this lecture isn't about creating stories. It's about how story structure a permeates everything, not only our communication but our understanding of the world. And B, provides a powerful way to shape your prose and keep your readers firmly engaged with whatever your content may be. But just as the word is the basic unit of speech, story is the basic unit of meaning. If you're a human being, you can't get away from it. It's ingrained in how we parse realities, endless stream of being into space, time and the objects traveling through them, each acting and reacting based on their conflicting and cooperating impulses. We think of story is made up of character conflict and closure. And we think of each as separate because that's useful to an extent. But none really exist without the other. There's a fourth component complications, but that's really more about taking an established melody and turning it into a symphony. To stick to the core three, character can't exist without conflict. Why? Because to be alive is to want, if you want something, that means you don't have it. And if you don't have something you want, that's a conflict. If I'm standing and I want to sit down, it's a conflict. Likewise, conflict can't exist on its own without a vessel, that vessel, whatever it is being character. Some people equate conflict with the more common usage of the word, a struggle or a battle. And it can be that, but it can also be everything from unrequited love to an elevator that never arrives, or even the plus sign and a mathematical formula. Dear heavens, the two and the two are exactly the same. But what will happen if they're added? Will they lose their identity, become something greater or both? Closure mean, well, obviously can't exist without something requiring resolution, which makes the very nature of that closure inherent in the conflict. If I want to sit, I either find a chair and use it, creating a positive closure. I get what I want or I don't find a chair creating a negative closure, I don't get what I want. Importantly, there is a third possibility. Something may happen that changes the character. So they no longer want what they thought they did. If I suddenly see a bed, I may decide I'd rather lie down and sit. The new conflict not lying down supersedes the initial conflict and is subject to its own closure. If the bed vanishes or breaks, I may have to settle for the chair. For now. We won't be as happy about it as I would have if I'd never seen the bed. Regardless, the path of characters conflict takes to reach closure is a story. To get across how universal this is, I'll use an example we don't generally think of as a narrative music. Ever wonder why there isn't a black key between every white key on the piano. It's because the 8-note musical scale DO Re Mi is based on conflict, attention and a release, a closure. In other words, it's a story. Briefly, the interval between two white keys separated by a black, he is called a whole step. If the two white keys aren't separated by a black key, it's only a half-step. And a complete scale consists of two whole steps, 1.5, step three whole, and 1.5. Now how does that create an resolve a conflict? Human beings are built to look for patterns. Patterns that could be useful, patterns that could be a threat, any patterns really. And those first two whole steps establish a pattern. Once we hear to whole-steps, part of us expects the pattern to continue with the third whole step. Using a half-step instead. Forts our expectations. Where's our third whole step? Now we have an imbalance. Human beings are also built to seek equilibrium, a lack of tension, closure for the conflict. When we encounter tension in any form, part of us wants to see it resolved. That half-step not being a whole step creates that tension. Hey, am I listening to random noise? The three whole steps that follow do two things. They restore the pattern. And since they have a different relationship to the first three notes, continue the tension, It's only when the final half-step sounds. That equilibrium is restored. A sense of closure is achieved and all feels right with the world. That's conflict enclosure. But where's the character? Surprise? It's us, the listener. We want a resolution to that tension. We are the reason the final note in the scale sounds satisfied. And just as you can't have a tree falls in a forest without someone there to hear it. You can't have a scale without a listener. What the, does that have to do with editing? Well, the same dynamic and release the drives a musical scale, drives narrative. Not only in the structure of an entire work, but now to each scene, paragraph and yes, sentence. And when it comes to editing, it doesn't only apply to your content. Editing, in a sense, lives on a parallel, perhaps more linguistically functional level, where the arrangement of the information itself plays into or thwarts our attraction to tension and resolution. To see how that works, Let's look at this sentence. The blue despise in the dog. Just he walks her freaks a lot twice a day hoping to run into Cameron. Conflict wise, there are two conflicts. Wanting to run into Cameron. The main conflict, hating the dog but walking it anyway, possibly to make any meeting seem accidental, possibly because Jesse has no idea how else to find camera is a related sub conflict. We'll talk a lot more about sentences next lecture. But to give you a basic idea of how that applies, this sentence has three phrases or clauses that can be arranged in six possible ways. They're all grammatically correct. They all have identical content, but each arrangement has a different effect. Some that utilize the natural flow of tension and release, some that do not despise in the dog. He walked, sir freaks a lot twice a day hoping to run into Cameron, low displacing the dog, hoping to run into Cameron. Jesse walked. So freaks a lot twice a day hoping to run into Cameron. Jesse walked, sir, freaks a lot twice a day, though, despite being the dog, hoping to run into Cameron though, disposing the dog. Jesse walked sir freaks a lot twice a day. Jesse walked, sir freaks a lot twice a day, hoping to run into Cameron. Though, despite being the dog. Jesse walks are freaks a lot twice a day, low disguising the dog, hoping to run into Cameron, which is the best. Well, for one thing, nine times out of 10, it's better to keep directly related clauses next to each other. Here, the two options that split Jesse's dislike of the dog with walking it by sticking Cameron in the middle are pretty clunky. Likewise, the two options that end with Jesse's dislike of the dog buries the sub conflict. That may seem appropriate in terms of content hierarchy, the main conflict is more important. But there's the rub. Once we're already wondering why Jesse wants to remedy camera, the dog seems like an afterthought. Make us in effect, double-back to appreciate that it's telling us how far Jesse will go to meet camera. For versions open with one of the two conflicts, Jesse's hatred of the dog or their desire to run into Cameron, both setup an imbalance that as in a musical scale, the reader naturally wants to see resolved. Those that opened with Jesse wanting to meet Cameron gives us the main conflict upfront. Then tell us how far Jesse is willing to go to get what they want to certainly a valid option. But since it's still buries the dog, not necessarily the best. On the other hand, opening with Jesse's dislike of the dog, those four things. First, it creates its own imbalance. Why walk a dog you dislike twice a day? Second, it strengthens Jesse's desire to see Cameron because we know how far they're willing to go at the outset. Third, it gives us the closure at the end. Completing a mini story arc. It's because Jesse wants to see Cameron. Lastly, it ends with a new question, one that motivates us to move on with the story. Who is this Cameron? That they're willing to do something they don't like just to run into them. Again, the content in each version is identical, the story stays the same. We've only altered the telling rather than added anything new or for that matter, cut anything out. Big picture, such small shifts may not seem like they matter much, but they do. The more each part of the whole is in tune with that primal rhythm of tension and release. The more the reader will want to see what happens next. Before moving on, I want to point out a couple of other things about this set. Depending if you know people named Jessie your Cameron Indoor, your own biases. You may have assigned them genders. You may be assuming Jesse has a romantic endorse sexual interest in camera. But all that's on you, the names are unisex and for all we know, Cameron owes Jesse money, perhaps some vital information Jesse needs to save the world. Which brings me to another point about humans, give us the slightest excuse and we'll start making up stories and filling in any blanks, readers, or your conspirators and creating the fictive world. And you can choose to work with them or against them. Which brings me to two important tips, writing tip Number 17. Readers don't know what you don't tell them. Sometimes they care, sometimes they don't. If you don't tell us Jesse put a leash on, sir freaks a lot before the walk. Absent other information, will likely assume they did. It's the default. And there are lots of them handy for avoiding describing a lot of LDL getting the dog, putting on a coat, opening and closing the front door kinda stuff. Assuming that Jesse is a particular gender and or has a romantic interest in camera. There's also a default, specifically a cultural default. The default being a form of reader expectation. I'll figure it's this, unless you tell me it's not. It's also key to the next tip, writing tip Number 18. Playing with reader expectations is half the fun of writing and reading, but don't be careless or mean about it. Everyone enjoys a playful trick. Not everyone wants to be the brunt of a practical joke. If the dog isn't on a leash and we're busy wanting to find out what happens when Jest runs into Cameron. Suddenly reading that the unleashed dog is modeling the school crossing guard could be more annoying than enticing. On the other hand, if we're told up front that the dog isn't done a leash that sets up its own tensions, giving the reader an expectation that it will be resolved. To paraphrase checkoff, writing to remember 19. If you tell me there's an unleashed dog and act one, it had better go off in act two. That doesn't mean the dog has to run wild per se. It could be a way to show that Jesse trusts the dogs disposition and your training despite their dislike of it. But there should be some payoff which makes the corollary writing tip Number 20. If it doesn't matter somehow in some form, don't tell us about it. Don't make us think about things that don't matter. It's annoying. Likewise, if it's only a few paragraphs before we find out Cameron owes Jesse money. That can be a cool payoff, but may leave us wanting to find out more. And hey, it doesn't mean there isn't a romantic interest involved. Again, our earlier examples weren't about content, but this is the dog is or isn't leashed. Jessie does or doesn't have a romantic interest in Cameron. That's the content. The question when editing is when best to reveal it, which is likewise related to tension and release, also known as story. And it operates pretty much the same way in sentences, paragraphs in the scenes, as we'll see in our next three lectures. Santa, the demo. And sometimes I lay down and something that just, just in the middle of occasional passes down and now somebody is holding me. If I'm drought and in my albedo, we'll have to do because I really hate to. Sometimes and it can stay governor and sometimes I've run around and around, maybe scream in my head off or I won't even make because I'm staking into the bladder scan and all that. Weight and formats, you drop brand next to you as the best that I could do. Some. Last day of the bar is where no one else can see. Mono whether to follow me. I do know is the model that I'll swim against the stream of you is three, t or dream and the dream of me. You know, I really need to chew. 5. WFL Editing 5: Editing Sentences: Lecture 5, editing sentences. Having covered the relationship between story dynamics and best editing practices. Here we'll go into more detail about how that works and sentences, along with a look at an issue particular to sentences run-up. To start with, what is a sentence? The answer might not be as easy as you'd think. As I was told in grade school, a sentence is a complete thought. But what makes a thought complete? The dog is not a sentence. It's just a dog. Well, maybe not just a dog. It could be the most wonderful dog in the whole wide world. But without more words, we have no idea. Still. Certainly think completely about a dog, or at least think about a complete dog. So again, what makes a thought complete? Grammatically, it's not just a person, place or thing, a KVM noun, but a noun performing some sort of action, aka a verb. The dog is running his essence. Notice that now there's already attention, implicit and unanswered question, making the content still feel incomplete. Why is the dog running? Is it fleeing? We're approaching at any of that. And as I discussed last time, you have a story. The dog is running toward Farmer Brown. The dog, a character is heading for Farmer Brown. Since the dog isn't there yet, that's a conflict. Once he arrives, that would be closure. And whether disclosure is good or bad for the dog or former Brown is another question. Sentences such as, the dog is running and the boy, he's laughing, the clown is hiding for sort of pretty stories. The last one being perhaps creepier than the other, is a simple sentence, always an implicit story. Well, here's the tricky part. The dog is, or perhaps more properly, the dog exists is also a complete sentence. There's still an implicit story insofar as one might wonder how the dog got there and what it's doing there. But that seems a stretch. So why is that a sentence and not the dog. I mean, it's still as far as we know, just a dog, right? Easy felt. Without some context, saying the dog exists is also redundant. Once you say dog, the default is that at the very least it exists. Existence is part of being a dog, No. But having verbs like IS or exists allows us to talk about things that may not exist. The dog ate my homework. You don't even have a dog? I do. So the dog is I mean, the dog exists on the flip side. Something like because the dog is evil, might sound like a complete sentence since it actually tells us something about the dog. But it's not, it's a fragment because and if, until, and many similar words and phrases are called conjunctions, meaning words that join different parts of a set. Whenever you see a conjunction, it means that understanding the complete slot requires more information. Caught the conjunction and without anything suggesting there's more. It's a complete thought, a sentence. The dog is evil. Importantly, while because the dog is evil isn't a complete sentence, it's a perfectly legitimate line of dialogue. Why did the dog eat your homework? Because the dog is evil? A dialogue uses a lot of sentence fragments because that's how we talk. Whenever two people chat, they can even wind up finishing each other's sandwiches. Meanwhile, back at conjunction, the parts of the sentence they connect our cold clauses. More specifically, a clause is a group of words with a verb usually separated by a conjunction or even a comma. Add a clause to our example and it becomes a complete sentence because the dog is evil, it ate my homework. If a clause has a verb or related noun, but no conjunction, it can usually stand perfectly well on its own as a sentence, making it an independent clause. Any complete sentence has at least one independent clause. It ate my homework. A sentence in itself is the independent clause here. Note that the order in which a clause is presented has nothing to do with whether it's independent or not. As I mentioned last time, clauses can often appear in any order. Throw in a conjunction, or if a clause otherwise depends on another clause to understand its meaning. And you get a dependent clause here because it makes the first clause dependent on the second. Let's go back to our main example from the last lecture and know I've no idea why I use dogs in both. I don't have a dog and I am allergic to do despite being the dog. Just see what, Sir, freaks a lot twice a day, hoping to run into camera. This sentence contains three clauses, one in simple past, two and present continuous, each with a verb and a related. Now, though, despite being the dog, Jesse walks are freaks a lot twice a day and hoping to run into camera. Only the second can stand on its own, making it an independent clause. The other to rely on it for their subject. Jesse, making them dependent clauses. As we've seen, the arrangement of the clauses alters the impact of the sentence. The best arrangement depends. As we also saw in the last lecture, this particular arrangement sets up a question that drives us through the clauses and gives us a form of closure. Another structural option is to present things chronologically in the order in which they occur. And it's generally more useful when the content consists solely of actions or events rather than motives and emotions. First this happens, then this happens for better yet on the basis of cause and effect. First this happens, then this happens because that happened. And to be clear, action and motives also mingle. Jesse walks the dog because Jesse hopes to run into camera. Here's a more purely action driven example. The dish shattered as it hit the ground, sending tomatoes steamed ceramic shards across the nice clean floor. The dish falls. Then because it fell, it shatters, right? Clearly, that reads much more smoothly then sending tomato steam, ceramic shards across the nice clean floor. The disk shattered as it hit the ground. In this case, there's no character question driving things forward. Once the dish shattered, we pretty much knew there'd be a mess. The details though bring the moment more to life. And of course, things don't always happen chronologically. They can overlap for occur simultaneously without any cause and effect relationship. Since words like sounds unfolding time one after another, we can't write two things simultaneously. In a sense, one has to appear before the other with time-specific conjunctions like as, during or at the same time, used to subjugate closet. Cameron continued screaming at the dog as the dish fell, shattered, incentive tomatoes, steamed, ceramic shards skittering along the nice clean floor. In this case, opening with the continuous action creates a smooth and flow, then ending with it. As the dish fell, shattered, incent tomatoes steamed ceramic shards skittering along the nice clean floor. Cameron continued screaming at the dog. Y. Then the first version, Cameron screaming through the entire sentence, echoing through the action. The second version makes the reader revise the image to get the whole picture. Now let's take a look at this one. Nero fiddled while room burns. Nero fiddled is independent. The use of while makes Rome burned dependent. And there is no cause and effect relating that to Rome isn't burning because of Nero's fiddling. Nor is Nero fiddling because Rome burned. You could just as easily reverse the status of the closet. While Nero fiddled. Rome burned. Notice though that Nero remains the focus of the sentence. Even if you split them up. Nero fiddled, Rome burned or flip them. Room burns. Nero fiddled. Because the relationship between the two is in physical. It's about Nero's character. The dramatic just remains. Still. Some arrangements are better than others. Why compare the two? Rome burned while Nero fiddled, while Nero fiddled, Rome burned. Both are correct. Both get the idea across. And the second, as we've discussed, the conjunction of the first clause sets up a question, what was going on while Nero fiddled. That drives us forward to the answer. But there's also something else going on that directly affects the flow or ease of reading. If the first thing you tell me is that Rome burned, that looms pretty large, creating images of buildings on fire. Screaming people wondering how the stone columns we usually associate with Roman architecture can burn and so on. If I then here that Nero fiddled, my brain has to double-back. Have to say, wait a minute, he's the emperor. Shouldn't you be doing something about the fire? Oh, he must not care about it. What a crazy thought was guy here. If I hear about Nero fiddling first though, the character is in place, oh, how nice he likes to fill. And the burning city comes as a surprise counterpoint, giving it more impact. For heaven's sakes, Rome is burning, stop fiddling and do something. It's essentially the difference between starting with an image of Nero fiddling and then pulling back to reveal the burning city. For starting with the long view of the burning city, then zooming in on nearer. The information is the same, but not the storytelling. Now you may think the distinction MOOC, that our brains sort this out pretty fast. But even a slight difference in one instance can across the many sentences of a novel, for even a short story, have an aggregate influence on the reader's connection. Point being you never want them to bat an eye. Which is not to say you should never ask a reader to think about something. But in all cases, writing tip Number 21, the reward has to be worth the journey. Let's look at a few more examples paraphrased from student exercises. Larry Carter discovers he has inborn magical abilities, although he lives in a world of non-medical people similar to as Rome burned and hoping to run into karen. The current version is grammatically correct and gives us character first min-conflict in story order. But the arrangement has our brain hop back to understand that conflict. On the other hand, although he lives in a world of non magical people, Larry Carter discovers he has inborn magical abilities. That not only gives us a question, also, what the use of non magical implies magical people also exist, giving us a hook that pays off when we find out that Larry is one of them. The darkness surrounds the car as neither of us break our gaze, again grammatically correct. But it puts the focus on the darkness in a way that makes us want to hear more about it rather than the character is staring at it. Whereas neither of us break our gaze as the darkness that surrounds the car puts us in the character's shoes first. So we focus on that darkness along with them. The first time I stepped into a classroom, I was 17 years old. After reading the first clause, we might easily assume we're going to hear about someone's first day of school. But then we have to double back to understand what the most interesting thing about that first day is. I was 17 years old. The first time I stepped into a classroom, on the other hand, gives us the age of the character and then the conflict in a way that blends the impact of boat. As with the darkness where with the character and experiencing the conflict. A final example for the non-fiction writers among those props with a subtler distinction, they would continue to produce absurd rationalizations no matter how many times they repeated the experiment, were told that there are continual absurd rationalizations. And then find out why they're absurd, because they keep repeating an experiment, presumably expecting a different outcome, which some defined as insanity. Assuming we already know from contact what the experiment is, it does set up a question, what makes their rationalization absurd? But it's an intellectual logical question, not a character based emotional questions. Whenever there's a choice, always center on the emotional. It's the stronger narrative. So on the other hand, no matter how many times they repeated the experiment, they would continue to produce absurd rationalizations. No matter tips us off up front that the repeated experiments are pointless. While the second clause describes the fluid motive, the experimenters are in denial, making the repetition sad, if not tragic, and giving it more emotional impact. Run-ons and ons. The result of rearranging clauses can be subtle but important. The impact of run-on sentences, on the other hand, is always obvious. Just as when we write, we like to jot down different ways of saying the same thing, producing redundancy. Sometimes we're so into it. We don't stop for things like punctuation. We've seen how multiple clauses can be connected, but is there a limit? Grammatically, technically, know, grab some conjunctions and connect as many as you like. Jesse walked through freaks a lot twice a day, and the dog loves being walked. Stylistically time two independent clauses together isn't great, but this particular result isn't terribly egregious. It's a little clunky, but we get it. Yes. Keep going though and you'll wind up with What's affectionately called a run on sentence. Two or more independent clauses create confusion rather than clarity as it using the leash that is red. Jesse walks through freaks a lot twice a day and the dog loves being walked on the streets of the city. And Jesse never fails, though. Jessie's mother thinks it's weird, knows Jesse doesn't like the dog and only wants an excuse to run into camera. And one might argue it has a kind of flow, a conscious field, but unless there's a big payoff for using that, don't. Yes, authors like Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, and Cormac McCarthy are famous for having pages and pages and prose that go on without a period, but they have reasons. It's part of their commentary on character of the nature of thought, et cetera, et cetera. And if you study it, you can understand it. Redundancy. If you don't have a really great reason for keeping a run on sentence, get rid of it. The solution fortunately, is usually simple. Split the runoff into more than one sentence based on its clauses. Using the lease that is red, Jesse walks, sir, freaks a lot twice a day. The dog loves being walked on the streets of the city and Jesse never fails. Jessie's mother, though, thinks it's weird. She knows Jesse doesn't like the dog. It only wants an excuse to run into Cameron. How that helps our example a bit, but it still feels awkward. Another task is to try to figure out ways to condense or streamline the writing, saying the same thing and fewer words. And obvious change here being that rather than using the least debt is red. Just say the red leech. Writing tip Number 22, possessives can provide opportunities for streamlining. The title of the book equals the book's title, the lives of the people equal to people's lives. The end of the day equals the day's end, and so on. Here instead of streets of the city, the city streets are just city streets. Keep in mind, that won't always work. The pancakes house rather than the House of pancakes actually means two different things. There are other dog that BU is much easier to parse than the dog that bit use hair. And the Rings Lord, just flat out doesn't sound nearly as good as the Lord of the Rings. Point being, don't let it become hob goblin number six. Contexts can also make additional cuts possible. Here, Jessie's mother knows, well, not obviously redundant is implicit in what follows and can be got using the red leash. Jesse walks, so freaks a lot twice a day. The dog loves being walked on the city streets and Jesse never fails. Jessie's mother, though, thinks it's weird Since Jesse despises the dog and only wants to run into Cameron. Another example for my student files. This will greatly assist the readers in understanding how to discern the critical difference between genetics and epigenetics. And the article overall with hope those interested in genetic testing assess the claims. While again, grammatically correct, this is a bit of a mouthful that can easily be split into. This will greatly assist the readers and understanding how to discern the critical difference between genetics and epigenetics. The article overall will help those interested in genetic testing assess the claims. If you're only dealing with two independent clauses and other solution is to make one dependent. This will greatly assist the readers in understanding how to discern the critical difference between genetics and epigenetics. While the article overall will help those interested in genetic testing assess the claims. That also helps, but to my ear, not as much as splitting it up. Writing tip Number 23, some suggests that if you can say a sentence out loud in one breath, it's a proper length. It's not a bad idea, but I prefer to rely more on the content. As in if it's too much to follow along in your head, it's too long. Not that the two are necessarily unrelated. For writers struggling with run-ons, I advise sticking to a maximum of two clauses per sentence if only to break the habit. Sometimes it can be hard to tell if a sentence is a run on without first dealing with other possible issues. And this is where the order in which you apply these editing rules becomes important. For example, at first glance, this looks like a runner giving him anything but solitude. He is driven to a place of homicidal madness as the voices echoes in impressions of the past, invoking invade his mind with an alternate reality that is anything other than what he bargained for. On closer inspection, though, there are additional problems including the misuse of a word. To look at it piece by piece, there are four clauses giving him anything but solitude. He is driven to a place of homicidal madness as the voices echoes and impressions of the past invoked and invade his mind was an alternate reality that is anything other than what he bargained for. And so here's writing tip Number 24. Always check for grammar and word choice first. To start with the error if you haven't spotted it, to invoke means to sum it up like a demon or a witness. And you can't invoke your own mind since he's already in this place of madness, I assume his mind as they are with it. A similar word, evoke, means to bring to mind, but you can't really bring your own mind to mind either. The author's intention may have been that this place of madness evokes or brings to mind the echoes and impressions of the past. But that much is implicit. So we'll simply cut writing tip number 25. Second, check not only for redundancy, but anything not necessary to communicating the jest or central meaning. Here, simply put the gist is that the characters being besieged by madness without a context telling us the character has been seeking solitude, giving him anything but solitude is superfluous. If that had been established, it would still be contextually redundant. If you give us a character that hasn't slept for two days and there were woken by law and more. You don't really have to say that it's providing anything but a comfortable sleep. Likewise, unless it's been established that he was bargaining for some sort of ultimate reality, the last clause, anything other than what he bargained for, it doesn't add much other than perhaps it sounded good. We might swap it with something like unexpected. But when it comes to sudden alternate realities, That's kind of the default. Unless you're intentionally opening a portal to another world, you're probably not expecting an ultimate reality. So let's cut both. So that leaves us with is driven to a place of homosexual madness as the voices that goes and impressions of the past invade his mind with an alternate reality, which as it turns out, isn't a run on at all. Writing tip Number 26 has the final step. Look at the structure in terms of the story. Since Despite the madness, we're basically dealing with action and invasion of the mind. Flipping the clauses into chronological order gives us, as the voices, echoes and impressions of the past and betas mind with an ultimate reality. He is driven to a place of homicidal madness. A final example. In this one, you get a sense of what's going on, but clearly, the words get in the way all the training Magnus father insisted she receive from the age of five when her special gift became apparent. It all made sense now as she set out to ascend the mountain that no one had ever set foot upon to retrieve a single drop of water that might alter an outcome that seemed to unchangeable. And it'd be fair to my students. They were tasked with writing a query with a limit of one pay. In an effort to summarize or pitches story, you have to pair things down. But importantly, that's not the same as trying to cram everything into a single sentence. As with our run-on about Jesse, here, we're looking at not just a few sentences, but at least a paragraph. As we'll see next lecture, graphical sounds. That data. And sometimes I lay down and sometimes just test in the middle of a Gaziano passes by. Bach. Somebody is holding me. If I'm drought in, in R3 abated and you have to do because I really hate to sound. Sometimes I run around and around, maybe scream in my head off or I won't even make them stick into the bladder. Scan and all the jar and the weight and formats you to drop brand next to you as the best that I could do. The last day of the bar is where no one else again, Z won't know where that to be. I do. Outflow is the model that I'll swim against the stream of you with three, add it D or dream and the dream of me. You know, I really hate to chew. 6. WFL Editing 6: Editing Paragraphs: Lecture 6, Editing paragraphs. As with many things in life, the definition of a paragraph depends on who you ask. Oxford language via Google gives us a distinct section of a piece of writing, usually dealing with a single theme and indicated by a new line, indentation or numbering. If some maybe organized around a theme and some may not, That's really doesn't tell us much other than there's somehow visually distinct from the rest of the pros. Study.com meanwhile gets into specifics. A paragraph is a brief piece of writing that's around seven to ten sentences long. It has a topic sentence supporting sentences that all relate closely to the topic sentence. Now we've got detail, not only in terms of length, but the idea of having a topic sentence anchoring the paragraph, putting all the other sentences into supporting roles. And yes, that much structure is expected in certain forms like academic writing or an instruction manual. But in narratives, not so much. Well, I certainly suggest attempting to stick to some sort of subjects in each paragraph. I don't recommend driving yourself crazy over it. In practice, one subject not only leads to another, they can become one another and importantly, overlap. You'll also run into paragraphs that don't have a clear topic or a subject at all. Like this. Cheryl's mother, eager to talk to a child, edged further into the room. Cheryl moan to dramatically as you pushed through the box further under her pillow where her mother couldn't see is the topic here. Mom wanting to talk, Cheryl wanting to hide something, the box that's being hidden or all three, as we saw last time with the clauses in a sentence, rearranging the sentences in a paragraph can shift the emphasis. Cheryl moaned dramatically. She pushed to the box further under her pillow where her mother couldn't see. Cheryl's mother eager to talk to her child. Edged further into the room. Start with Cheryl and mom seems like an intruder. Start with the box and the question of what's in it becomes the focus. As she pushed the box further under her pillow where her mother couldn't see. Cheryl moaned dramatically. Charles, mother eager to talk to her child, edged further into the room. Naturally, whatever gets mentioned first is the first thing that we're your thinks about. Just as naturally our minds than organized, whatever follows around that first impression. One could argue that this makes whichever sentence comes first the topic sentence, but not necessarily. Here, as is often the case, the topic, subject or just of the narrative, can really only be determined within the context of preceding paragraphs. If we've been following Sheryl and her thoughts up to now, sheets still be the topic. If we were following her mom and how much she missed the long chats used to have with Cheryl. Her effort to reconnect becomes the topic if we just been given a history of the box and how it happened to fall into shuttles hands. It's about the box. So while discrete, meaning individually, separate and distinct, in some sense, paragraphs even more than the sentences are inextricably connected to their surrounding, perhaps understandably than Mary and Webster's definition lowers the bar and the minimum length to one sentence. A part of a piece of writing that usually deals with one subject that begins on a new line and is made up of one or more sentences. And hey, they don't even bother with a period. So is that even a sentence or what? While closer to actual usage by that definition. And as I mentioned earlier, the only difference between a sentence in a one sentence paragraph is the indent. Honestly, I don't have a better definition of what a paragraph is. But in terms of editing and writing, there are three other things about them that I can tell you for sure. First, that indent, skipped line or whatever always creates a dramatic B. For instance, galley turned the knob, she took a deep breath. She opened the door. Has a different feel than galley turned the knob. She took a deep breath. She opened the door. And a still different feel from Gelly turned the knob. She took a deep breath. She opened the door. And even this version, jelly turned the knob. She took a deep breath. She opened the door. And yes, I know those aren't sentences, but I did it for a reason to illustrate the effect of the brake. Second, if you go on too long without starting a new paragraph, it results in an unreadable blob of text. Paragraphs make things easier on the eyes and the brain. So as I previously said about run-on sentences, unless you have a great reason, at least as good as mine in the previous example. One in which creating an unreadable blob of text actually enhances the experience. Don't do it. Every five lines are so hit Enter. It's easy and it's fun. Three Last but not least, paragraphs work best when the sentences within them, assuming there's more than one. Our arranged for flow, meaning either chronologically or for the sake of storytelling. With that in mind, let's revisit that enticing run-on sentence I left you with last lecture, all the training Magnus father insisted she receive from the age of five when her special gift became apparent. It all made sense now as she set out to ascend the mountain that no one had ever set foot upon to retrieve a single drop of water that might alter an outcome that seemed unchangeable. When we read it through a few times or once very carefully. Even though it's tricky to SAS the timeline, the sentence makes sense. The gist is a moment in which Magda, as she sets out on an important quest, realizes what all her training was four. And oh, yeah, by the way, she has a special gift. And a drop of water on a mountain. No one's ever been to his needed to possibly avert and unchangeable outcome. Since it required training despite her special gift, we can assume that the Quest will be difficult and that unless the seemingly unchangeable outcome gets changed, it will be bad enough, at least for Magda and her father to warrant the effort. If the author regularly uses that sort of structure and you stick with them, you may even get used to it. But then the question becomes, is it worth your while to stick around that long, especially with billions of other things out there just waiting to be read. In any case, because of the multiple clauses in their arrangement, the brain has to stop repeatedly to parse them, rather than smoothly building magnets world, it takes us right out. Let's break down the pieces. At the age of five, magnets special gift revealed itself. Ever since her father insisted she'd be rigorously trained. She's setting out to climb a mountain. No one else has ever visited. Just a retrieve a drop of water. The drop of water can alter something that otherwise seems unchangeable. As she sets out all the training makes sense. Give each their own sentence and presto, you have a paragraph. Magnus gift revealed itself when she was five, ever since her father insisted she'd be rigorously trained. Now it all made sense. She was setting out to climb a mountain. No one else had ever visited. There. She had to retrieve a drop of water. The single drop might alter an outcome that seemed unchangeable. That's certainly more readable. Assuming the mountain in its water are the oldest things here. Chronologically, it might look like this. There was a mountain, no one had ever climbed on it. A single drop of water could be found. Low-water could alter an outcome that seemed inevitable. Magnus gift revealed itself when she was five. Ever since her father insisted she'd be rigorously trained, she set out to climb the mountain and get the water. Now, it all made sense. The clarity is arguably improved, but crucially, a chronological order isn't always the best choice. In this case. Notice that the only thing happening in the moment the now is her realization, her training, the discovery for special gift, the need for the drop of water. All of that's in the past. Since this takes place after all that, the story begins in medias res, in the middle of things, a popular narrative choice. For example, John Milton's epic poem, Paradise Lost, about the war in heaven between Satan and God's Angels. And the creation of man begins after the war is over with the defeated same tied to a burning lake in hell. Milton, a master of storytelling and juggling complications, gives us the epic war later as a flashback, more recently, project Hail Mary by the Martian author any, we're, starts off with someone in a spaceship who has amnesia, carrying the reader along with the character as they tried to figure out who they are and what they're doing in space. Both setup a question in the reader's mind, how did we get here? But in our example, while the content occurs in media arrest, the present now comes at the end. So what have we shift them to match? Now it all made sense. Magnus gift revealed itself when she was five. Ever since her father insisted she'd be rigorously trained, she was setting out to climb a mountain. No one else had ever visited. There. She had to retrieve a drop of water. This single drop might alter an outcome that otherwise seem to unchangeable. This way, we're motivated at the onset to ask the magical question, what makes sense? Now? The following sentences provide an answer creating a sense of satisfaction. Or in story terms are many closure 0, all the training makes sense now because she needs that water. Having built a paragraph out of a sentence, let's look at how to edit one that already exist. It's based on a student's summary of the short story, Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep by Philip K. Dick, which became the famous film Blade Runner. To keep our focus on the paragraph structure, I've already checked this for grammar and redundancy. And just to make things interesting, I put the text in a program that randomized the sentence order. Rick decades job is to hunt and destroy Rogan Android's. The only way to distinguish Android from human is a test designed to measure empathy, a trait which Android's supposedly do not have with manufacturers making each generation of Android's better than the last. The line between man and machine increasingly blurs. An assignment to terminate a group of new Nexus six types forces Rick to question his basic assumptions about humanity and whether we can still do his job. Some indirect rebel, killing their masters in fleeing back to Earth, where they tried to pass as human. Radioactive dust polluting the air. Much of humanity has left to the Earth, taking Androids with them as slaves. I've talked about the problem of dragging readers out of the fictive world. But I've also mentioned the flip side, that readers are very active conspirators and building that world. A famous example is this sentence, which can be read despite the rearranged letters. Here, as we read, even though the sentences aren't in an optimal order, our brain still works to build a fictive world. But also, as we've seen, only up to a point. In this random arrangement, we're first told about decades job, how he finds Androids, and how that's gotten harder to the point where he is unsure of themselves anymore. Perfectly fine story. But then we're given the state of the planet and the history of the Android. And this causes our brains to double back, making the world-building feel like an ad on the fact that they're increasingly human only makes them sound creepy and more like a threat. They have no empathy, and they are after all, killing real people. A hunting rogue Android's doesn't sound like a bad thing at all until we get to the very end. That last sentence though, is the kicker. Learning that humans have already screwed up a planet makes our species less sympathetic. Finding out the androids are rebelling from slavery makes them more sympathetic. Not only fleshing them out as characters pun intended, but also adding depth to Rick's dilemma. No small part of which is the question of whether these new models do have empathy. A chronological version might go like this. Radioactive dust polluting the air. Much of humanity has left the earth, taking Androids with them as slaves. Some Androids rebel, killing their masters in clean back to Earth where they tried to pass as human. The only way to distinguish Android from human is a test designed to measure empathy, a trait which Android's supposedly do not have. With manufacturers making each generation of Android's better than the last. The line between man and machine increasingly blurs. Records. Job is to hunt and destroy Rogan Android's an assignment to terminate a group of new Nexus six types forces rectal question has basic assumptions about humanity and whether you can still do his job. Here. The enslaved Android's whose masters couldn't even take care of their own planet are more sympathetic upfront. Decker, killing these poor machines is less sympathetic until we learn HD becoming conflicted. But decorate is a main character, the center of the story, and we don't even meet him until the last two sentences. That's a common dilemma when it comes to complex science fiction and fantasy worlds, where the world has to be understood before you really understand the character. Thing is the character can still be introduced first, provided they present some sort of question, dramatic or otherwise, that the following sentences expand on as they describe the world. Ric decades jobs to hunt and destroy rogue Android's radioactive dust, polluting the air, much of humanity is left to the Earth, taking the Androids with them as slaves. Some indirect rebel, killing their masters in clean back to Earth where they tried to pass as human. The only way to distinguish Android from human is a test designed to measure empathy, a trait which Android supposedly do not have. With manufacturers making each generation of Android's better than last. Line between man and machine increasingly blurs. An assignment to terminate a group of new Nexus six types forces Rick to question his basic assumptions about humanity in whether you can still do his job. Here we meet read in a way that poses two related questions. Why does he have to hang Android and why have they gone rogue? They could simply be broken, making r6 potentially a hero, risking his life to save others from some crazy machines. So we're with him more or less by default. Learning about the pollution and the Androids next, rather than feeling like a sharp turn is it wasn't our first version. Now adds layers answering those initial questions in ways that make R6 job more ethically complex. What the hell is he doing killing these beings, just trying to free themselves. In the end, when we find out he's thinking along the same lines as we are, What the hell am I doing? His character requires more depth and retains our sympathy, producing a more organic whole. And that, as they say, is the trick. Editing of course, isn't only about rearranging and delete it. Even though I've described editing and revising content is different processes because it's useful. The editing process almost always asks for addition, but there's still a key difference. Any additional writing you do while editing isn't about introducing new characters or plot twists. Though by all means, if you have a great idea, go back into writing mode and do it. The kind of writing done during the editing process is more about building on what's already there, then adding anything completely new, which is an admittedly thin line. To go back to our first example in its original run on form here, even though that medius rest moment of realization could be compelling, there isn't enough detail to fully draw us in. We're not even told what in the moment triggered it, why it all made sense now, was it just the fact of being on the journey for dinner training coming useful in a way she appreciated for the first time, though interlope a bit on the realm of creating content, even a small extra detail could give it more onthe as she cooked the game she'd killed. She realized with all the training was four. Likewise, while the situation may be intriguing in and of itself, the telling isn't. In fact, telling never is. Bringing us back to the second and arguably more important writing adage that I believe in show don't tell without a detail like cooking the game. This is all merely telling the dread exposition, explanations, not story moments. Had we known about magnets training, seen it, gone through it with her while she didn't know what it was for, being given a tactile sense of its difficulty, the moment of realization would have a lot more onthe again, her father cried, I'm tired. Magda, and again, he spit the word. She brought the x down for hours, days, and years. Now, she finally realized what it was all for. Not only would it be answering a question, what was it all for? The tension behind that question has been raised by narrative momentum. And that momentum can and should be just as much about character as it is about details like chopping wood. If Magda hadn't just been confused about the purpose of the training, but actively rebelled against it as a result, ditching it whenever possible, even to the point of putting herself in her father in danger. A common trope, by the way, they would have even more resonance. Next up, we'll see how using those principles can turn this paragraph into our final discrete narrative unit, a scene. And how the same editing rules apply. Some info for the demo. And sometimes I'll do something that is just in the middle of a Gaziano passage way. If I'm down and now our somatic, if I'm drought and in my batteries abated and after, because I really hate to sometimes step. Sometimes I run around and around, maybe scream in my head off or I won't even make them stick into the bladder. Scan and off. Sit and wait and formats you drop down next to you. As the best racket. Sometimes steal the car is where no one else can see mono whether to follow me. I do know is that I'll swim against the stream of you with three t or dream and the dream of me. You know, I really need to chew on. 7. WFL Editing 7: Editing Scenes: Lecture 7, editing scenes. This lecture covers our final dramatic unit, the scene. In one sense, a page can also be considered a dramatic unit. Just as starting a new paragraph creates a dramatic be sodas flipping a page. But while a creator can control that in a graphic novel when it comes to prose, even in the hardcopy world, page length varies based on font, font size, page layout, and even things like kerning, adjusting the space between letters. There is of course, also the chapter. But not only are many chapters, one scene long, sheer size makes them unwieldy to review in a video lecture. As I said back in Lecture 2, it's not necessarily what you know so much as how long you can pay attention. For the same reasons. Here I'll focus on a single example, the copy of which in its various forms appears as a PDF in the course materials for easier reading. Crucially, crucially, he said redundantly, the identical rules apply to chapters. Synonymous with a view. The scene comes to us from the theatre where the view or location changed between curtains or by accenting portions of the stage. And in that sense, that's what it means. A place, uh, given the physics involved in staging plays, dramatic sequences generally occur in a single place. Many definitions, few to that idea, along with sometimes awkward phrasing that makes one feel as if they're still searching for the right words. Columns. A scene in a play, movie or book is a part of it in which a series of events happened in the same place. Your dictionary. The definition of a scene is a place where something occurs or a setting in a story. Wikipedia seen as a dramatic part of the story at a specific time and place between specific characters, specific characters. What does that even mean? What's a nonspecific character? And why can't they have scenes? In practice, a new scene doesn't equate to a new location. Many if not, most places have more than one scene taking place on the same set. So ultimately, the history of the word ties it down in ways that aren't necessarily useful. Mcmillan and starts to get at that problem with a part of a playbook, movie, et cetera, in which events happen in the same place or period of time. Here at least it can be more than one place as long as it's during the same period of time. But the thing is in prose, a scene isn't necessarily tied to place or time. If someone's having flashbacks to ancient Rome, the chronology could cover centuries and thousands of miles. Seems can go anywhere at any moment through memory, flashback or in science fiction and fantasy teleportation. Along those lines, Oxford language gives us the even vaguer, a sequence of continuous action, Play, movie, Opera, or book. If the vagueness feels familiar, that's because we had the same problem defining a paragraph. It's kind of sort of like this, but a little of that. And ultimately, you'll know when, when you see it, which is not to say that you can stick any bunch of paragraphs together and call it a scene. They have to have a structure, chronological or dramatic, a question asked and answered. Consider this classic scene from Silence of the Lambs, where the editing makes us think the police are closing in on the killer while agent Clarice Sterling is safely following up on a routine question. But they're not. And neither is shape. Sorry to bother you. In a sense, you're bouncing back and forth between scenes. But in another more important sense, this is a single dramatic unit. Are rising tension and closure. That said, while I hesitate to use the word always, there's very likely a single place anchoring the scene, similar to a topic sentence in a paragraph, and silenced by the end of the scene or sequence, whatever that means. It's clear that the important place is where Clarissa's the killer's house. For a closer look, I've taken that run on sentence turn paragraph from last lecture and expanded it into several paragraphs, a complete scene. I've kept them short to make things easier to follow. In practice, your paragraph mileage will vary. I've also already gone through the steps of checking for typos, grammar, redundancy, and run on sentences. Magnus gift revealed itself when she was five. She was sitting in the dirt counting dandelions as her father split would increasingly annoyed by the coin crows. When she playfully told them to quiet down and give him a hand, they did six to log the lifted and stacked. Ever since her father insisted she'd be rigorously trained with the daily routine of meditation and exercise. By seven, she can make owls gathering the day. And as many as 10 dear march information. All the while, she wondered why the previously genial man made her work so hard. So often. She was setting out to climb a mountain. No one had ever visited. The smooth pebbles in the dry stream bed, push that her sandals, bruising the soles of our feet. Bad enough. But soon her journey would give way too rough stones and refer boulders, were it not for the Eagles swirling protective layer above. She'd have no idea how she'd ever reached the plateau and it's pristine glacial lake. If she made it, she'd be the first up there. She'd have to retrieve a drop of water. Only a drop. Up there to the right and just beyond the highest peak, she could see the flat space for goal. Barely. She imagined more than saw clear, sparkling reveal. It's running over and down to cleanse with little of the world that could reach. A single drop might alter an outcome that otherwise seemed unchangeable. And it was only in the final hour before she left. Her father confessed that until he saw what he could do, he believed their doom to be inevitable. But now he knew that she could change it. That she would change it was erased then or now. Was she or death inevitable? Now it all made sense for years, not understanding the why of it all hurt so often and so well, she became numb to it. But understanding brought the old pain back and terrifying that the consequences were unified by now it all made sense. They form a single dramatic unit, one that could stretch across a chapter as easily as a scene. And here's the coolest thing ever. Going back to the O, so crucial adage of show don't tell writing to 27. Once the contextual detail is provided, the exposition becomes redundant and can be deleted. As I said last lecture, the original paragraph tells us everything. It was abstract exposition, lacking any tactical details to bring things to life. Now that we have those details showing the story moments, we can eliminate the telling. In other words, all of that original runoff and still follow along arguably in a more immersive manner like so, choose sitting in the dirt counting dandelions as a father split would increasingly annoyed by the coin crows. When she playfully told them to quiet down and give him a hand, they did six to log the lifted and stacked with the daily routine of meditation and exercise. By seven, she can make owls gathering the day. And as many as 10 dear march information. All the while, she wondered whether previously genial man made her work so hard. So often, the smooth pebbles in the dry stream bed push that her sandals bruising the soles of our feet. Bad enough. But soon her journey would give way too rough stones and refer boulders. Were it not for the equals swirling protective the above. She'd have no idea how she'd ever reached the plateau and it's pristine glacial lake. If she made it, she'd be the first. Only a drop up there to the right and just beyond the highest peak, she could see the flat space for goal. Barely. She imagined more than saw clear sparkling reveal it, running over and down to cleanse with little of the world that could reach. It was only in the final hour before she left. Her father confessed that until he saw which he could do, he believed their doom to be inevitable. But now he knew that she could change it. That she would change it was erased then or now with xi or death inevitable for years. Not understanding the why of it all hurt. It hurts so often and so well, she became numb to it. But understanding brought the old pain back. And terrifying though the consequences were with the details creating more fully formed fictive moments. Each paragraph also has its own poll, creating some level of desire to find out what happens next. And ultimately how the story will turn out if magnet will succeed or fail and request. At the same time, each raises different questions, creating different emphases based on the order in which they're red. And as a result, different strengths in terms of flow and momentum. Starting with only a drop, for example, pulls us into a strong visceral moment that makes us wonder what the drop of waters for. Of course, his story events unfold. A chronological structure will usually dominate, certainly within a scene. But as long as the reader remains are willing conspirator to an extent, the arrangement can often be a matter of personal taste. Going back to our Blade Runner paragraph on Decker, though, I would argue that the one that asks the most compelling question up front, that places the others in a context that widens the character in the world rather than engages the reader. Piecemeal is the best. In that case, see what happens if we just move that last paragraph in the first place. So now wondering about the why of it all feeling it through magnets, pain pulls us through the rest. The details of her physical journey expand the world along with her character and the stakes. Importantly, we still don't know what terrible thing to water might prevent other than it's bad. If we continue to care enough about Magda and her journey, we may not need to know for a good long while. Along those lines. A final point from sentence to scene, while yes, we've been looking at building blocks. We're also looking at levels of story from micro to macro. As such, every example we've looked at can either be expanded or redacted every sentence made into a scene or every scene covered in a sentence. Each of these six moments originally a sentence. Now a paragraph can also be expanded into a scene. Further expanding that first paragraph might look like this. She was sitting cross-legged in the dirt counting dandelions, frustrated that she couldn't remember what came after five, which was after all her age, a few feet away. Her father split wood for the evening fire. He was frustrated too. But in an angry adult way. It wasn't the work that never seemed to bother him. It was the murder of crows that lit upon their humble roof. Every time he raised to the x. Never when it came down, they screamed at him, not to stop him, just to annoy him. Playfully. She stood up, face to them, put her hands on her hips and said, minute you quiet down in help. And they did six to a log, they lifted in stacked as the twin gaping mouth of the two humans accented how much father and daughter looked alike. Even more details can be added. A description of the setting, the weather, her father's face when he sold the crows, even the path of the shards of woods split by the following acts, moving in tune with the irritating cause. You could talk about dad chopping wood for a pager. So for Magda counting daisies if you like, provided you keep it engaging. But this puts us more in the realm of the other 1%, the part of writing that isn't rewriting another subject for another class. Point being, aside from the various strategies and tips we've discussed, perhaps the most important takeaway from this course is to recognize that the units of your writing, again from the micro to the macro, are much more flexible than you may think. And if you edit correctly, your real darlings, the ones that live at the core of your work, really can't be killed. Assure you may fall head over heels for a phrase that's far too precious. But keep in mind It's just a decoration, a brilliant disguise. There's always something deeper going on. And in keeping with our vague definitions, you'll know it when you see it. Next up our last lecture, a bit of a review as we edit the work of the rich and famous Santa and Zach and the devil. And sometimes I lay down and just test in the middle of a Gaziano passes down and out or a block that is holding the time. If I'm drought and in my albedo, we'll have to do. Because I really hate Jews. Some call on our end. Sometimes I run around and around, maybe scream in my head off or I won't even make them stick into the bottom. Scan and off the job. Sit and wait and fall much you drop brand next to you. As the best that I could do. Santa Barbara is where no one else can see. Mono. Welcome back. To. Let me do f of 0 is the mole, Adam. I'll swim against the stream of you with three, add a d or dream and the dream of me, you know, I really need to chew. 8. WFL Editing 8: Editing the Rich & Famous: Lecture 8, editing the rich and famous. Just to show no one's perfect, kick the clay feet of our gods and otherwise make ourselves feel better through the mistakes of others. For this last lecture, I'll be reviewing some of the concepts we've covered through the lens of popular pros. To be clear, these are not bad writers. Well, not all of them. I'll let you decide who's who. And these are also not random passages. I had to look for them. But let's dive in. As I said in Lecture two, typos happen to everyone much more so in the pre-digital age, when a printer would have to take a typed or handwritten manuscript and set each letter for the press. An excellent example of this, as James Joyce's originally self-published novel, Ulysses. He wrote the epic tale of Stephen Douglas and Co, and what's been called illegible long hand using a steel pen, then he added a 100 thousand words. So the page proofs also by hand and all, yeah, the French typesetters who put this altogether, didn't speak English. Joyce was so troubled by the sloppy results of the first edition had an insert. Reading. The publisher asks the readers indulgence for typographical errors unavoidable in the exceptional circumstances. A free volume edition of Ulysses released in 1984 corrected 5000 emissions, transpositions and other errors, including things like the paper, the beard was wrapped in. What should have been the paper the bread was wrapped in and wait, would he feel it if something was removed, which became weight or size of it? Something blacker than the dark. Wonder would he feel it if something was removed? Feel a gap. Literary critics bending over backwards to make sense of some of his prose. And hey, that's half the fun, found themselves saying things like, Oh, it was bread. I should also note that a lot of these 1984 corrections have since been challenged, but not as far as I know, the bread, complex and highly open to interpretation to begin with, Joyce has a unique case. Sometimes it's hard to pay attention. Sometimes you just don't. Beyond typos, there are also outright errors. And Robinson Crusoe from 1790 by Daniel Defoe. Crusoe strips naked and swims out to a sinking ship, then carry supplies back to shore by shoving them in his pockets. No, no pants, no pockets. In Robert Hind line, stranger in a strange land from 1961, one character's name repeatedly switches from Agnes to Alice, which really someone should have caught. Likewise, shifts in tents most likely occur because someone's not paying attention. As in this example from Stephanie mayors Twilight. I couldn't decide if his face was beautiful or not. I suppose the features were perfect. As we know from the lecture on tense. It should either be, I can't decide if his face is beautiful or not. I suppose the features are perfect. Or I couldn't decide if his face was beautiful or not. I suppose the features were perfect. Then there are those passages that seem to have been proofread. It still leaves something to be desired. This one from page 424 of Stephen King's, It is more a question of clarity. Eddie handed him the bottle, Stan took to hesitated, then took another he gave the bottle back and swallow pills one after another, grimacing. Then he went on with his story. Read it twice and it makes sense. But on first read, stand took two, makes it sound like he's already taken the bills while he's only putting them in his hand. Making it a bit confusing when he then swallows them one after another. A clearer version might be heavy. Handed him the bottle. Stand shook out two pills, hesitated, then shook out another. He gave the bottle back and swallowed them one at a time, grimacing. Then he went on with his story. When it comes to overuse. Back in lecture three, I mentioned my reactions, George RR Martin's use of wicker in Game of Thrones. And to be fair, I went back and check. Turns out he only used it's seven times and hundreds of pages. Now that may not seem like a lot, but to me it wasn't unusual words, so it stood out and took me out of the moment. And one scene, I couldn't unsee it. Moving on to redundancy, specifically of the contextual variety. Here's another passage from Stephen King's it, this one on page 147. He lost it and made a hissing sound of disgust between his teeth. What's the contextual redundancy? Well, who here can make a hissing sound that isn't between your teeth? I know I can't. It's akin to riding. He spoke using his mouth. Here's a similar example from JK Rowling's Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone. Let's do that. Dysfunctional Literacy.com. It's an invisibility cloak, said RON, a look of, ah, on his face. Putting aside that being odd by an invisibility cloak is arguably redundant itself. Where else would the look of all a b but on his face. Now let's get a bit more complicated with, Here's another bit from Harry Potter. This one from the Deathly Hallows page 85. Ron and Hermione gave roars of outrage, but Harry said nothing. He pushed the newspaper away. He did not want to read anymore. He knew what it would say. Nobody but those who had been on top of the tower when Dumbledore died knew who had really killed him. And as read, a skater had already told the wizarding world, Harry had been seen running from the place moments after Dumbledore had fallen. The first sentence is probably fine, but the uncommon usage of gave makes it feel a bit clunky, at least to my American ears. In any case, what's wrong with Ron and Hermione roared without rage. Beyond the needlessly complex use of a colon and semicolon. The second sins also has a bit of redundancy with the phrases. He pushed the newspaper away. He did not want to read anymore. Why else would he pushed the newspaper away? Making those changes gives us Ron and Hermione roared with outrage, but Harry, he said nothing. He pushed the newspaper away. He knew what it would say. What follows is a fairly packed a run on sentence which among other things, repeats Dumbledore is demise with died and killed. Splitting that into and getting rid of the repetition gives us nobody but those had been there when Dumbledore fell from the top of the tower, knew who had really killed him. As read, a skater had already told the wizarding world, Harry had been seen running from the place moments after. According to several sites, this one is from the Twilight fanfiction turned novel, Fifty Shades of Grey. I downloaded the novel and searched a few online versions to check, but mysteriously couldn't find it. Maybe the addition has been updated or whatever. In any case, I think this awkward description of taking a shot and pool is worth a look. I line up the white ball and with a swift clean stroke, hit the center ball of the triangle square on with such force that a striped ball spins and plunges into the top-right pocket. I've scattered the rest of the balls. The first issue to get technical is that given the subject I, this reads is if I hit the center ball rather than the white ball with a swift clean stroke, rather than the white bull hitting the center. But to be fair in baseball, you would say I hit the ball rather than the VAT. But here, given the rest of the sentence, it only adds to the confusion. For instance, on first read, I wondered what a triangle square was before realizing the full phrase was square on. In terms of the grammar, that's if not totally legit, close enough. But using a word that also means a geometric shape, right after a word that does mean a geometric shape muddies things. From triangle, the mind naturally goes to squares a shape rather than a direction. The geometry issue continues. You can't hit the center or eight ball dead or square on since it's surrounded by other balls. I assume the author meant the head of the triangle, also known as the one ball. Lastly, the rest of the balls would scatter as a result of the same hit of the white ball. But the phrasing I'm scattered makes it sound like an additional rather than simultaneous action. The tens also shifts from the present of line up, hit plunges to the past with scattered. It's certainly fine to have a character who hasn't played pool before not know that the white bull is called the cue ball, but the action itself can certainly be clarified, as in this revision, I line up the white ball and send it off with a swift clean stroke. It hits the head of the triangle dead-on with such force that as the rest of the balls scatter a strict balls spins and plunges into the top-right pocket for our final passage. But let's take a look at another from 50 Shades spiritual parent twilight. This one from page 45 of the Kindle edition. Do you mind if I look? He asked as I began to remove the slide, his hand caught mind to stop me. As he asked, his fingers were ice cold like he'd been holding them in a snowdrift before class, but that wasn't why I jerked my hand away so quickly. When he touched me, it stung my hand is if an electric current had passed through us. As with the previous passage, the author is trying to describe a few things that happen at the same time or in rapid succession. As she starts to remove the slide, he touches her. As he touches her, she feels coldness and a shock that immediately makes her polar handbag. This isn't particularly indecipherable in terms of grammar, but the structure steps on itself. Initially telling us what he said creates an image of the character speaking. When we then find out what the narrator was doing at the time, we have to revise that image to include her action. Then in order to describe what he was doing at the time, She asked to repeat. He asked well, it has a bit of a cadence to it. He asked, as he asked. It works against the clarity of the fictive moment by having us revisit it. The three additional bits of information that follow how his hand felt, the fact that she jerked your hand away and why she dragged her hand away, increase the clunky feel. It'd be fair. I can see why opening with the sound of his voice would be tempting. It's tactful and in some sense more immediate. Since when we read, we're already hearing the author's voice through the words. But in terms of the content, the physical actions are just as if not more tactful, particularly in romance. They put us in our body rather than our mind. If instead we clip and extraneous word here on their open with the physical action of beginning to remove the slide. Then follow with the physical interruption of his hand and only then go to his words which explained his interruption. And then end with her ensuing reactions. It creates a more natural flow and eliminates at least some of the doubling back. As I began to remove this slide, his hand caught mine. Do you mind if I look, his fingers were ice cold like he'd been holding them in a snowdrift. But that wasn't why I drink my hand away when he touched me. It's stung like an electric current and improvement. I think so. I could go on and to be redundant on and on with similar examples. But ultimately, whether it's sentences, paragraphs, or scenes, editing comes back to the same rules in the same order. Check for typos and grammatical errors. Eliminate all three forms of redundancy. Eliminate run on sentences and structure your sentences, paragraphs and scenes in ways that a make for the smoothest read and be impel the reader to move forward. I didn't begin my writing career with these rules. And even as they grow in time, they were more about bone memory. It was only through teaching that I needed to really sit down and figure out what they were and how they work. A process which in itself has, I hope, improve my own writing tremendously. If however you use them in fits and starts or in their entirety, I hope you'll find them as useful as I have. The ultimate goal being to bring as much clarity to your work as possible to keep the focus on the world, not the words. Thanks for watching. And please feel free to post any questions or thoughts. Sometime and Zach and father, the devil, and sometimes I lay down and just test in the middle of a Gaziano passes by. If I'm down and out or somebody is holding me. If I'm drought and in my abated and we'll have to do because I really hate to. Sometimes sometimes I run around and around. Maybe they scream in my head off or I won't even because if I'm sticking into the bottom, skim it off the job. Sit in the middle, weight and fall much you drop brand next to you as the best that I could do. Far as where no one else can see. Won't know whether to follow the map. We do know is the momentum. I'll swim against the stream. All of you with three add a d or dream and the dream of me, you know, I really need to do.