I hate revising as much as the next guy. Regardless I can’t deny its value. To lessen the load, most writers come up with personal rules to make the process more streamlined. The “cut and paste” method is one of those.
Compared to the alternatives, which require plenty of rewriting, this particular system is exactly as the name implies: you cut parts of the text and you paste them. Well, not exactly, since you’ll probably insert some additional text in between. For the most part, though, that’s how it will go.
- Separate the wheat from the chaff. Pick out the good lines and keep them. Sort out the bad ones and cut them out.
- Take the good lines and arrange them in logical order. Play with different sequences to see which works best to arrive at your meaning.
- Figure out from the sequence you’ve decided on what the essential meaning of the piece is. While you may have had a different idea at the start, the words may be pointing at a different thread. We suggest going with the flow, rather than forcing a change.
- To properly connect the individual bits you’ve kept (as well as round out the ideas each of them details), you will naturally need to do some writing. It can be a lot of writing or just a small amount, depending on how much of the original draft you ended up keeping. Either way, you have to sufficiently round it out in as few words (ideally) as you can.
While the above still sounds like a lot of work, it’s actually considerably less-intensive than other revising options. Paired with a complete writing software, it’s likely the shortest route you have from a draft to a finished piece.
