Revising is... hard.
I ended up revising that picture book story and giving it to the teacher last Friday and I got it back today. She said she was really impressed with how I applied the criticism to improving the story and that moments like these are 'the reason she teaches', that it pleased her on a personal level. This version got 85%, but judging by the comments and the individual scores that added up to that (all scores of eight or nine, not a average made up of low marks and high marks) that I guess it was a solid 85%.
It's the biggest difference between writing for fun and doing it for real, I guess. I love sitting down to a blank page and just... creating. But the part where I have to chop it up and take out the 'unnecessary', reword the vague, and show instead of tell... that's so hard that it hurts. It's so hard to separate the words from the writer, from me. If there's a failing in the story, isn't it a failing of mine?
It's scary to think that the real, true difference between being /just/ a writer and being a published writer is /editing/, that thing I really hate to do. Heh.
But I guess I can do it, even if my knee-jerk reaction is to be really, really upset about it.
It's the biggest difference between writing for fun and doing it for real, I guess. I love sitting down to a blank page and just... creating. But the part where I have to chop it up and take out the 'unnecessary', reword the vague, and show instead of tell... that's so hard that it hurts. It's so hard to separate the words from the writer, from me. If there's a failing in the story, isn't it a failing of mine?
It's scary to think that the real, true difference between being /just/ a writer and being a published writer is /editing/, that thing I really hate to do. Heh.
But I guess I can do it, even if my knee-jerk reaction is to be really, really upset about it.