Writer finishes first draft. 90,000 words. Celebrates.
Editor returns it: "Cut 30,000 words."
Writer: "Which ones?"
Editor: "The bad ones."
Writer: "They're all my children."
Editor: "Then you have 30,000 ugly children."
Writer deletes 30,000 words. Sends revision.
Editor: "Better. Now cut 20,000 more."
Writer: "I only have 60,000 left."
Editor: "Exactly."
将此代码粘贴到您网站的HTML中以嵌入此内容。
Workshop critique: "Deus ex machina! Lazy writing!" Fine. Revised. Made god's appearance earned. God appeared in chapter 19. Looked around. Pulled out paperwork. "I've unionized," he said. "Speaking fee is 3000. Miracle fee is 8000. Saving protagonist from poor planning is 15000 plus residuals." Protagonist died. Workshop approved.
Book signing day. Arrived early. Table: ready. Pens: uncapped. Books: stacked. Two hours later. Table: ready. Pens: still uncapped. Books: still stacked. No people came. Except the chair. The chair came. The chair stayed. The chair saw everything. I don't use that chair anymore. It knows too much.
Sent manuscript to publisher. 400 pages. Hardcover-ready. Publisher sent it back. In a smaller box.
Here's a fun party trick: name three famous dystopian novels. If you said 1984, Brave New World, and The Hunger Games, congratulations—you've just listed three books that owe their entire existence to a bald Russian engineer most people have never heard of. Yevgeny Zamyatin, born 142 years ago today, wrote 'We' in 1920, essentially inventing the modern dystopian genre before getting himself exiled for being too honest. George Orwell literally called 'We' the model for his own work. Aldous Huxley suspiciously claimed he'd never read it.
Writer's retreat. Mountain cabin. Two weeks of isolation. Came back with 0 words. And a goat. Won't explain the goat.
"Your character arc is flat." "He's a pancake." "Metaphorically?" "Literally. Chapter 4. Witch."