Manuscript Pyre

I have shared here before that I save everything. I never erase any of the ideas on my computer--even single sentences get saved. I have come to the conclusion that life's journey, the writing journey, is so twisting, with so many unexpected corners and hills--up and down--that I will never know when something that once wasn't working might be resurrected when I, as writer, am in a different place.

But when is it time to abandon a manuscript. To put it on the great manuscript funeral pyre?

Note, I said I never erase anything. I don't say, though, that I never abandon anything. I do. I wouldn't have a thousand saved ideas and files and sentences if that didn't mean at some point, what I had wasn't working and I knew it was time to give it a rest.

But . . . it's all in discernment. It's all in the writer and his or her process. Writing can be hard--not hard as in back-breaking labor, but hard as in sometimes you really have to write through slumps in a manuscript, through scenes that aren't working, through a voice that just isn't coming to life. You work it through and end up with something good.

But I have also seen writer friends take that philosophy and stick with manuscripts that I think are beyond hope for the moment. I have seen someone so determined to write an idea that they write and re-write the first chapter fifteen times and it STILL doesn't work. At some point, is it time to move on--for now--to something that "clicks"?

The question is individual. I will look forward to seeing the responses. I think for me, there is some internal voice that says, "You have something here." I may not know what it is, but I just can feel it. And that same internal voice, sometimes, gets real honest and says, "You are not executing this well right now. Let it alone. You are not the writer for this--AT THIS MOMENT. Come back to it." And I know the journey of writing may afford me an opportunity to come back to it when I am the writer for it AT THAT MOMENT.

I know working on multiple novels at the same time doesn't work for everyone, but I like to think that for me, it allows me to discern. I don't feel a pressure that I have to make THIS manuscript work NOW. Maybe it's a bit like the scultpter and clay. I can mold it, re-wet it in the morning and fix what didn't work yesterday, and I can wait for the clay to speak to me. I don't have to take something already turned to stone and try to chisel away at it. I can wait for the organic process to happen.

On a purely practical point, sometimes when I know a manuscript has "it," but I do not, I consider it a temporary thing. Like having a writer flu. I don't abandon it permanently, but only until the flu passes and I can return to it with enthusiasm. Sometimes all it takes is seeing an inspiring movie, a day of rest, a day of fun, or a week's vacation.

So . . . when do you know it's time to put something on the manuscript pyre?

Peace,
E

P.S. I cannot tell you how many emails I got from lurkers who read the story in the COMMENTS section of the syrup post--the story about my son sticking like flypaper to the kitchen table. I am so glad my ridiculous life makes you all laugh! :-)