Working Out a Story -- Revision

IV. Revision

1.  Revise for proportion. You will find that some incidents have been given more space than they deserve, that other parts are hurried so that the reader does not have time to develop the proper emotion.

2.   Study your paragraphs. See that they are all true paragraphs and correctly composed.

3.  Study your sentences. See that there is due variety in length and type and that none is awkward, involved, or ambiguous.

4.   Study your words. See that each is the best for its place and that none is superfluous.

5.   Study the mechanical appearance. Try to see what your story will look like when it is printed. There should be a somewhat uniform distribution of solid and broken matter from beginning to end. Long solid passages suggest dullness; long columns of monosyllabic conversation suggest frothiness. After this revision it may be necessary to examine your paragraphs and sentences again.

6.  Put your story aside for a month or more and then revise it again if it need it.

7.  Make a final copy as fair and beautiful and perfect in every detail as possible, at the same time making a carbon copy to retain in case your manuscript is lost in transit.

All this may seem a good deal of work for one story, but it is better to put all the work on one story that will sell than on a dozen that do nothing except increase your postage bill.

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