All language subtitles for MasterClass Neil Gaiman Teaches The Art of Storytelling - 17Editing

to be an artist

um and particularly to be a writer,

what you are doing is a two-fold

process.

And to put it very simply, it's a

process of creating and then it's a

process of fixing or of editing.

The first thing you do as a writer is

you explode. You explode like a bomb

explodes. You explode onto the page. The

story is an explosion

and you get to the end of it.

And once it's done, then you get to walk

around it and you get to look at the

shrapnel and the damage it did. And you

get to see who died and you get to see

how it worked. And that's the point

where you get to think about it.

You get to think about what works and

what doesn't work.

For me, once I've finished writing

something, whether it's a short story or

a novel or a script,

what I do, if I can,

is I

leave it, walk away, do something else,

and then maybe a week later, maybe 10

days later, print it out, come back to

it

and try and pretend

and pretend like a method actor. Pretend

like this is the most important thing in

the world to me. pretend that I've never

read it before and I know nothing about

it

and then I read it and it's very easy

gets easier the longer it goes I think

for me just to pretend that I've never I

don't know anything about this thing.

I'm reading it as best I can

as a reader and I do it printed out

because I have a pen or a pencil with me

and

I am

not vicious, not cruel, but I'm

a reader and I will make notes in the

margin of anything that doesn't work for

me as a reader.

Some of the time it's things that I

thought I could get away with as a

writer.

There's that point where you're a writer

and you go, "Well, I don't need to write

the whole battle, do I? I can just sort

of I can imply that it's happening." And

you go, "Yeah, and nobody's going to

mind." And then you're sitting there as

a reader going,

but I was expecting that battle. You've

led everything up to this battle and you

don't even real.

So you write the note saying needs a

battle and um and you try and pretend

that you as a writer and you as a reader

are two different people

because you're going to look at your

notes at the end and that's what is

going to really guide you. That is going

to be the primary engine

through a second draft, through an edit,

through a fix.

When you get to the end of your first

draft of whatever it is, whether it's a

short story, whether it's a novel,

um

then you read it and you read it

pretending you've never read it before.

You read it with new eyes. And one of

the questions that you ask yourself when

you get to the end is, okay, what was

that about?

And that's the most important question

that you can ask yourself

because the difference between what

you're going to do in the first draft

and the second draft can often be tiny.

But it's the most important

draft is getting to that second draft.

And the question, what is this about is

what gets you from the first draft to

the second draft. Because what you're

then doing

is you're going, okay, in which case

what I have to do now

is buttress

what the story is about

and eliminate those places where I'm

writing stuff that isn't what the story

is about. And it gives you just a

wonderful easy yard stick for what stays

in and what goes out is just the idea of

what is my story about? You've you've

now written it.

What you thought it was about probably

isn't what it's about or it's only part

of what it's about.

And now it can become very very obvious

that this little bit of plot that you

loved actually is just has nothing to do

with what the story is about. And that's

good. And you can let it go. You can cut

it out. You can save it in a file where

you save things that may come in useful

later. But it's okay. There is never any

heartache at letting that go because

you're going, "This is what it's about."

And by the same token, you're

buttressing.

You're going

here. I sort of did that thing. This is

where I I didn't quite know what I was

doing, but I seemed to be talking about

the theme. So, let me go in and make

that stronger. Now that I know what this

is about,

let me go in and just sort of shore up

the sides. The process of doing your

second draft is a process of making it

look like you knew what you were doing

all along.

You always have to remember

when people tell you that something

doesn't work for them that they're

right.

It doesn't work for them.

And that is incredibly important

information. You also have to remember

that when people tell you what they

think is wrong and how you should fix

it, that they're almost always wrong.

Sometimes they're right. Sometimes they

say, "Hey, this doesn't work, but you

could do this." And you go, "Whoa, thank

you." You just But most of the time when

someone goes, "This didn't work for me.

Maybe we need this or this."

You have to go, "Right, that doesn't

work for you." That's the important

information.

And you think this or this would fix it.

But actually, normally the problem is

earlier. Normally the problem is earlier

in the text. Sometimes it's something

that needs to go away. Sometimes it's

something that needs to be written to

set something up. Um

it is really important knowing and

absolutely accepting in faith when

things do not work for people.

But do not ever take that as anything

more than information that something

doesn't work for people. Because if you

try and fix things their way, you'll be

writing their story and you have to

write yours.

long long ago

on Sandman.

Um, I wanted it to be colored by a man

called Steve Whitaker. Steve's now dead.

Terrific artist,

really good colorist. He colored Vif for

Vendetta.

Steve was a perfectionist

and I gave him the pages of Sandman,

black and white pages and his job was

simply to color a few of them in and

send them in to show the editor that he

could do it.

The job was his. All he had to do was

send in those pages

and he never did. Steve would show me

some of his pages and they were

beautiful and I would say, "Great, send

them in." and he was saying, "No, no,

no, not yet. They're not quite right.

They're not perfect."

And he was trying to make them perfect.

And the people at DC Comics

hired a colorist because Steve's pages

never came in.

Perfect

does not happen in this universe.

Perfect is an ideal. Perfection is the

goal. Perfection is the mountain that we

are heading towards. It's the gleaming

crystal city on the hill to which we

aspire.

But

we also have to know that anything we do

is going to contain its share of errors

and mistakes and we cannot be crippled

by that. We cannot be afraid of that.

Um,

if you write something, it can be

improved. The problem is

you cannot fix a blank piece of paper.

You can fix a short story that doesn't

work. You can fix dialogue that isn't

quite there. You can fix the beginning

of something, but you cannot fix

nothingness.

So, you have to be brave. You have to

just

start. You have to be willing to let the

process carry you through. And you have

to be willing for it sometimes

to land you on the rocks,

for it not to work. And the truth is,

I'm sitting here as an instructor. I'm

sitting here as a teacher.

I'm not sure I have much more of an idea

of what I'm doing now than I did when I

started 30ome years ago. I know that if

I'm going to write something,

some things are going to be better than

other things, and I won't necessarily

know why.

But I do know

that I need to have faith in the

process. I do know that if I don't write

the story, there is no chance that it's

going to be one of the good ones, one of

the loved ones, one of the ones that win

the awards, one of the ones that becomes

famous, one of the ones I can read at a

public reading that people will love. If

I don't write it, it will never be that

thing.

And if I obsess and worry about the ones

that I write where I look at it and go,

"Oh,

I thought you were going to be better.

you were such a lovely idea and you're

not really magic. Then that feels like

I'm also closing the doors on the ones

where I go, I had no idea you were going

to be so beautiful.