Novel What does your rough draft look like?

Discussion in 'Genre Discussions' started by MVP, Feb 12, 2012.

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  1. PumpkinLord45

    PumpkinLord45 New Member

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    On a piece of paper that I usually write during school with some of the worst handwriting ever. It's more of an outline though.
     
  2. Jethelin

    Jethelin Member

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    A 120 page single-spaced 12 font Microsoft Word document. Plenty of bold parts marking the places that for sure need re-writing or significant change to fit with the story later. Then at the bottom or working end of my very very long document I have tons of pictures copy and pasted to use as reference if needed. Notes on cover design, how many men are in a Roman Legion, whatever "to complete SB" means, and a bunch more random notes. Everything is nice and orderly until you get to my note section. Then all hell breaks loose :cool:
     
  3. topeka sal

    topeka sal New Member

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    1. Scribble with pen in notebook.
    2. Transcribe onto computer, making changes/adding things as I go.
    3. Print draft-in-progress.
    4. On printed draft, make changes with pen.
    5. More scribbling in notebook.
    6. Transcribe changes and new scribbles onto computer draft.
    7. Print.
    8. Repeat as necessary.

    I waste a lot of paper this way, but I find that each medium causes my brain to function differently. I hear and see things in each format--scribbles, computer screen, computer print-out--that I would miss otherwise.

    I also read everything aloud as I go along. It's just one more medium that helps me to hear what it is I'm doing, right and wrong.
     
  4. jo spumoni

    jo spumoni Active Member

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    "What does your rough draft look like?"
    Shit. Thanks for asking. I'm not being funny or cynical. It's just plain bad. My 50 pages have gotten to a point where, short of repeating the same luke warm sentiment in scene after scene after scene, I can't think of what to do. I still think the idea is there, but I'm almost ready to accept that I lack the patience or ability or...(cringe) maturity to write it. But that's just how I feel now, at 1:35 PM on 15 February, 2012, in Dublin, Ireland, at the Starbucks across from Trinity College. In, say, 30 minutes to an hour, I'll probably change my mind, because that's a recurring theme with me.

    Ha, I bet you regret asking this question now, don't you?
     
  5. AMA

    AMA New Member

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    Oh ye olde rough draft...

    CheddarCheese had me pinned at garbage. My first draft is usually made up of several mangled ideas, from random sketches to fancy words I'll probably never actually use to chicken scratch cursive looped all over the pages (not always in a straight line) to doodles when writer's block bites me.. Yeah.. For me, the first draft is something no sane person should ever see... :redface:
     
  6. minstrel

    minstrel Leader of the Insquirrelgency Supporter Contributor

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    One of the great things about the writer interviews in The Paris Review is that they offer a sample manuscript page from the writer they're interviewing. When these interviews first started back in the 1950s, the sample pages were fascinating - many handwritten, many typewritten with huge amounts of hand-corrections and new material in the margins, etc. Nowadays, though, too many of them look like just plain, finished text, because everyone uses word processors and the corrections don't show. I think that's too bad - a lot of the writer's personality is lost, along with at least an impression of the anguish they go through in writing.
     
  7. Youniquee

    Youniquee (◡‿◡✿) Contributor

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    Well, my rough draft...is just overly long with tense changes, spelling mistakes and inconsistencies. I can't imagine writing a draft on a paper, my hand would seriously ache and I would probably end up misplacing it. So, for that reason, I do all my drafts on word~
     
  8. MVP

    MVP Member

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    Awhile back, I read several of the interviews on that site. I never noticed the link to see manuscripts, pretty cool!
    I agree, there is something special about the way the authors would hand write their drafts.
     
  9. JimmyM

    JimmyM New Member

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    I'm about to finish the first draft of novel after years of false starts that never got past 20,000 words; on my laptop I have folders called Novel 2006, Novel 2007, Novel 2008 etc.

    One major difference this time is that I have saved each chapter of my current manuscript as a separate MS Word file. This reduces the temptation to tinker with existing words as I open and scroll through the whole document.

    I still have to open and refer back to previous chapters but this technique has helped enormously. Of course, I'm sure to be in for some nasty surprises when I begin the edit...
     
  10. NeedMoreRage

    NeedMoreRage New Member

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    My writing folder is a cluster of dozens of text documents. I name the documents really odd things, most of the time I just punch the keyboard and name them that. It got to the point where I had to come up with a code system for different projects I'm working on because I was literally getting lost in my writing folder.

    As for the documents themselves, I mostly just have the program I use automatically indent my lines, then I'll put a space between each paragraph. I write my documents so that ebook programs will be able to convert them to ebooks very easily. I don't bother with proper manuscript format because I have no intentions of sending it to publishers, but I do intend to run these documents through converting programs and the manuscript format is not ideal for those programs.
     
  11. funkybassmannick

    funkybassmannick New Member

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    For the latest story I wrote, it was chaos when I first sat down. I was alternating between brainstorming, outlining, and straight up writing, sometimes doing all three at once. I used a hierarchical number/bullet point format in Word, organizing it by scenes:

    1) I walk into the room
    a) This is what I observe. Everybody stops and stares at me.
    b) They are staring because I am sexually attractive. This is nothing new to me.
    2) (next scene)

    I could add either a tiny piece or a whole monologue, then if I had an idea for the beginning, I could easily bounce over to the beginning. I could be totally random and it wasn't a huge mess in the end. It really catered to my ADD-ness.
     
  12. Tesoro

    Tesoro Contributor Contributor

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    I did that too with my current story, or worse, I had one document for each scene! i couldn't decide atm when and where in the story some of the scenes would appear so I found this a lot easier. Now I just have to patch everything together. :p and then revise.
     
  13. MRice

    MRice New Member

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    If it wasn't for my computer(s) I probably would be buried in piles of scraps of paper. :D I'm one of those people who see's what I want to write as a full color movie in my head. It's almost impossible for me to hand write as fast as I think. I have no order to my writing, I just write. So I have tons of little files all in one folder I simply call writing.

    My latest project however I'm keeping several folders. One for backgeound files and stuff and one for the copies of files I share with my writing group and one for the main parts of the project.
     
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