Revision: Patrick James

[Sondra Perl]

#825

Chapter 7 made me reflect a bit on my writing process. More specifically, how I draft and revise. I think of myself as both an overwriter and an underwriter. Sometimes I throw everything on the page, the good and the bad, and then I sort through the valuable and disposable sections later. Other times I write a brief sketch, only to add detail, exposition, and clarification later. In any event, the most uncomfortable part of the writing process is the first draft. In Chapter 7, the author states that “Those who write first rarely have writer’s block because they set the initial bar of expectations low: just write. (97). This advice is crucial for me, because it allows me to get the raw materials I need in order to form and mold my piece. The first draft then is a matter of setting my ego aside and allowing myself to write badly. Once I have text on the page, then I feel a bit freer, a bit more relieved. That’s usually when the fun begins, because revision is the process in which things start to take shape, to surface.

For me, revision has always been a matter of the body. Something I feel in my gut. And Chapter 7 describes revision as an “intuitive act” (94), one that is “sparked by a more conscious and critical assessment of a draft’s language and meaning” (94). I really identify with this point, how revision is rooted in intuition, a sense of feeling one’s way through one’s own text, searching for hot spots, for pain, for humor. It reminds me a bit of Professor Perl’s felt sense. A turning inward. Asking one’s self, “does it feel right?”

I was recently discussing my writing process with a friend of mine who is also a graduate student. And I told him that, for me, writing is a lot like being on a paleontological excavation. There is something on the surface that tells me to dig. As I brush away the dirt and sand, the bones of a foot become clearer, they start to surface. As I brush away more dirt, I find the legs, a skull, and before I know it I see the shape of things: it’s a dinosaur (what I really mean is: it’s a draft—but you get the point). Writing is not about dreaming something up, inventing something new. It’s about revealing a truth that has always been there, waiting beneath the surface.

That being said, revision is about surfacing for me. Through intuition and felt sense, what I’m trying to create becomes clear over several drafts. It makes its way from the murky depths of my subconscious to the surface of the page. The first draft is about letting go, striking out into the unknown—and the revision process is about being led, holding on to what I feel, following my intuition to the end of the draft. Consequently, writing for me is a great deal about trust—trusting both myself and the process.

[Sondra Perl]

#835

Absolutely!

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