More Q&A with bestselling author David Wroblewski about the experience of working with his editor...
LR: How did it feel to have an editor to work with after having worked on the book for so long?
DW: I had contradictory emotions. It was a great relief not to be working alone anymore. I understood that I'd taken the book as far as I could on my own, and if it was going to be improved, I needed to work with someone with more experience. On the other hand, I had a fairly clear idea about how this novel ought to work. And I knew that aesthetic decisions can be made collaboratively only up to a point, after which they are emotional, intuitive, irrational. My great fear was that I would find myself in a position where I couldn't explain my reasons for revising (or not revising) something, and look like a nut case. Which I suspect I did, sometimes.
Lee, to her great credit, understood how to manage this dynamic much better than I. Immovable object v. irresistible force situations rarely happened, and when it looked like we were getting close, we talked things through. Have I mentioned that Lee is hilariously funny? She made me laugh during our editorial discussions, often precisely when we were talking about the most difficult issues.
Plus, Lee worked HARD on the editing. Sections of the manuscript had pace problems, where the drama should never have flagged and yet did. Several times, I simply could not see how to go about making repairs. When that happened, Lee pushed up her sleeves and mapped out a solution (or several) and got me rolling again. 2007 evaporated in the process. When I looked up, it was August. Then November.
more to come...
LR: How did it feel to have an editor to work with after having worked on the book for so long?
DW: I had contradictory emotions. It was a great relief not to be working alone anymore. I understood that I'd taken the book as far as I could on my own, and if it was going to be improved, I needed to work with someone with more experience. On the other hand, I had a fairly clear idea about how this novel ought to work. And I knew that aesthetic decisions can be made collaboratively only up to a point, after which they are emotional, intuitive, irrational. My great fear was that I would find myself in a position where I couldn't explain my reasons for revising (or not revising) something, and look like a nut case. Which I suspect I did, sometimes.
Lee, to her great credit, understood how to manage this dynamic much better than I. Immovable object v. irresistible force situations rarely happened, and when it looked like we were getting close, we talked things through. Have I mentioned that Lee is hilariously funny? She made me laugh during our editorial discussions, often precisely when we were talking about the most difficult issues.
Plus, Lee worked HARD on the editing. Sections of the manuscript had pace problems, where the drama should never have flagged and yet did. Several times, I simply could not see how to go about making repairs. When that happened, Lee pushed up her sleeves and mapped out a solution (or several) and got me rolling again. 2007 evaporated in the process. When I looked up, it was August. Then November.
more to come...
No comments:
Post a Comment