by Ros Woolner
“If you see a cliché kill it dead” That’s the first line of a fun poem by Emma Purshouse entitled “Advice for undergraduates resubmitting work for this semester’s poetry module”. Her advice for members of Bilston Writers editing poems and stories was:
Are there two or three poems/flashes going on in one?
Topping and tailing – how many lines can I remove from the top/bottom before the poem/story loses its sense?
Is the poem wearing itself well on the page? Have I chosen the right form/layout?
Is this poem/story really about me? Experiment with I/she/he/they (including inanimate objects)
Is every word earning its place? Also look for words and phrases you overuse. Read aloud. Again and again.
Send it for a comp or a magazine. If it comes back five times, reconsider whether you got it right. Show it to a writing buddy. Consider turning e.g. a poem into a piece of flash fiction (or vice versa).
And because we’re a writing group and we always spend part of every session writing, Emma immediately sent us off to spend 30 minutes editing one of our own poems or stories using the first five points on the checklist.
When we came back, we had a chance to talk about the experience. Some people had managed to cut words and lines from their writing and make it tighter, some had experimented with the form of their poems, others had identified and removed clichés or experimented with the point of view. Some described the process as fun, others had found it difficult or painful.
What happens if you edit your story so ruthlessly that you lose the atmosphere? Emma’s advice is to be ruthless anyway (but keep your original draft!) and put stuff back in afterwards if you need to for atmosphere. And if you’re working on a poem, you may be able to put something you’ve taken out in the title or even in a footnote.
Emma had promised to answer questions on publishing and poetry collections at the end, but before that she gave us 10 minutes to turn our poem into a piece of flash fiction or our story into a poem. As always, her workshop was the perfect balance of talking and writing, advice and practice. And what does she advise if we find the editing process difficult or struggle with suggestions for improvement? Consider all advice, but remember you don’t have to accept all of it. And, when you recognise that you do need to make changes, tell yourself “It’s only words!” (and keep earlier drafts, just in case).
Emma's publications include:
Dogged (a novel), Ignite Books, available from https://ignitebooks.co.uk/products-page/emma-purshouses-books/
Close (poetry collection), Offa's Press, available from https://offaspress.co.uk/shop/
The Nailmakers' Daughters (poetry collection with Iris Rhodes and Bilston Writers member Marion Cockin), Offa's Press, available from https://offaspress.co.uk/shop/
I Once Knew a Poem Who Wore a Hat (collection of poems for children), Fair Acre Press, available from https://fairacrepress.co.uk/shop/i-once-knew-a-poem-who-wore-a-hat/
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