Creative writing is the act of using words to tell a story. However, no matter how good your original idea was, it will never be perfect until you go through at least some sort of revision. Otherwise, you might find yourself writing an incoherent mess that makes no sense. The following are just a few reasons why revision is so important in creative writing.
It Gives You the Opportunity To Refine Your Ideas
Revision gives you the opportunity to go through your work and find errors that you might have overlooked when you first wrote it. Sometimes, a story will come out perfectly the first time you write it, but then you will later realize that there are parts of it that just don’t work. When you go back and change those parts, your story might end up being much better than what you originally wrote. This is why it’s important to go through revision because it gives you the chance to find these imperfections and make changes to improve your work. Moreover, it prevents you from publishing incomplete work because everything you write is subject to change and improvement.
It Helps You Discover New Ideas
Since creative writing is subjective and open to interpretation, it can be difficult to know exactly what you are trying to say until you go through at least some sort of revision. Sometimes, you will come up with an idea and it will click with the readers, but then you will later find that there are parts of the story that did not sit well with you. When you go back, you can either decide that the entire story needs to be scrapped or you can find the elements that worked and use them in a different manner to produce an entirely new story. Either way, revision gives you the chance to try out new ideas and new approaches to writing.
It Helps You Measure Your Success
Whether you are writing for publication or just for yourself, it is always a good idea to go through revision every once in a while. The reason for this is that it helps you see how much your writing has improved over time. For example, if you are writing a short story, you can go back and compare the first draft to the final product to determine how much of an improvement you have made. Moreover, doing this periodically gives you the chance to see how much your writing has changed and evolved over time, which can only be a good thing.
It Makes Your Writing More Sophisticated
Since we said that creative writing is open to interpretation, it follows that the better your writing, the more you will be able to tell through your words. Therefore, it is always a good idea to go through revision so that your writing becomes more sophisticated. As a writer, you will often find that the first draft of your story will sound very much like what you had in mind, but then there will be small things that you could do to make it much more sophisticated. Sometimes, it just takes a little bit of effort to be able to see your work from a different angle and find the good and the bad in it. This is why it is always a good idea to go back and revise your work once in a while.
It Forces You To Be More Confident
Writing is often a very self-doubting profession, which is why it’s important to go through revision from time to time. When you go back and change something that you did not like or that just did not work, you are often very confident that you did a good job because you have no choice but to be perfect or close to it. This can help you overcome your self-doubts and give you the confidence to keep writing even when you feel that you have nothing new to say. Since the only way you will be able to improve is by going back and revising, you will always have something new to show for your efforts even if the results are not perfect at first.
It Provides You With More To Work With
Revision gives you the opportunity to go back and find the little details in your story that you might have missed when you were writing. If you don’t want to go back and change every single part of your story, you can simply add more to it. For example, if you are writing a novel and you realize that you do not have enough material to make it the complete length that you had in mind, you can either choose to add another chapter or you can create brand new characters and write an entire book around them. If you are feeling extra creative, you can even combine the two and have your existing characters interact with the newcomers in an interesting manner.
It Makes Your Work More Accessible To Readers
Since we said that creative writing is subjective and open to interpretation, it follows that the better your writing, the more you will be able to tell through your words. Therefore, it is always a good idea to go through revision so that your writing becomes more accessible to readers. Sometimes, this can simply mean getting out of your own head and into the heads of your audience, which can be a daunting task if you haven’t done it before. Moreover, rewriting can often result in you discovering new story angles that you might have not been able to think of when you first wrote the piece. In short, revision will help you find the good and the bad in your work and make it more accessible to a broader audience.
It Is A Sign Of Resilience
Last but not least, we’ll say that going through revision is a sign of resilience. Many creative writers quit when they feel that they do not have enough material to make their story the best that it can be. However, those who are able to keep going back and revising are the ones who will be able to succeed in this profession. Since the only way to improve your work is by going back and revising, those who are able to do this show great courage, which is something that you might want to consider when striving to become a better writer.