Revision is a fundamental process in the development of one’s writing and work, it pushes your work to a peak in its development through continuous alteration and interpretation (You can find several interdisciplinary examples of the reinterpretation process in my blog post: Theme And Variation Across Disciplines). Revision, is of course necessary in all works and disciplines; rewriting and developing an idea in any field or discipline will produce the most efficient and understandable work, making your ideas clear for the individuals in your field to understand. Unfortunately, in spite of the ultimate benefits of the revision process, it may prove difficult or uncomfortable for some individuals to begin and detach themselves from ideas that do not develop or add to their work (Practice What You Preach; a tribute to skateboarding).
People often more than not become attached to the ideas they initially create, ultimately synthesizing a hiatus for the writing process—as they hold on to these ideas, they become unable to focus on the purpose of the ideas and unable to properly execute them. While the initially created ideas may be extremely interesting, they may not always prove appropriate for the purpose of one’s writing. Soon into an individual’s stubborn attempt to incorporate all of their ideas into a single product, they begin to try and mold the ideas in order to fit the requirements of a task or assignment. Ultimately, the message or purpose they were trying to convey become blurred by a series of incomplete ideas. Pushing your own ideas away may be challenging, but the action will enable you to write a focused and well-organized idea.
Beyond this hesitation of detachment, there is an issue of time management involved in the process of revision as well; a limited amount of time prescribes a limited or small amount of revision (An Idea On Procrastination And An Attempt To Combat It). Fortunately, with continuous practice individuals become more adept at the process of managing revision; time management will improve with practice, but more importantly, soon the time needed to complete one revision cycle might shorten and the process for initial writing might change to better prepare for the revision process (Preparation For Success). Of course, before one begins to properly practice revision and become more efficient with revision, they must be able to revise; they must become acquainted with the steps and requirements for revision and take on a receptive approach to their writing.
The process of revision is only possible with a receptive approach in your writing, you must be willing to reinterpret your own work and ideas; you must not attach yourself to all the ideas that result from your initial writing—more than often, in early drafts of writing, people tend to incorporate a significant amount of interesting ideas to be developed; the choice to remove several of those ideas to focus on one is a difficult one. It is important to establish a clear goal when completing a project and to omit any unnecessary ideas, as interesting as they might be, should they not develop or aid in the development of your goal or thesis. In the Reader and Text course, we the students were given the opportunity to practice our revision via the multiple blog posts we could write and through the opportunity to rewrite one of the larger essay assignments on the Bacchae and Frenzy—the posts and essay rewrite were an excellent device for growth and development as writers.
Throughout the semester of the Reader & Text: Percival Everett course, I dealt with and conquered the difficulties surrounding the revision process—through the process, I developed as a writer. Initially, I suspended my approach to the writing; I was extremely scared to initiate the process (Atychiphobia). Intimidated by the assignments and the large amount of time I believed was required for the appropriate execution of these assignments, I halted the creation of any blog material until the middle of October. Moreover, I was also not completely aware of the benefits to my writing that the blog post assignments would offer, so I avoided the process and procrastinated.
In my procrastination my writing did not improve, but as I regularly attended class I became fascinated with the course material and gained an urge to write about it. As time passed and I continued to invest myself in the class and its content, I wrote a set of ideas and began writing my first blog post: The Significance in the Origin of Discipline—it took me two weeks to complete the assignment. When I began the process of writing this post I was unaware of how difficult it might be to start; I learned this difficulty when I tried to manage and incorporate all the ideas that I had created into my first post.
Fortunately, the beginning of my blogging journey was accompanied by the completion of my essay on The Bacchae and Frenzy—The Bacchae, a play written by Euripides, depicts the story of an encounter between the god Dionysos and the members of Thebes; Frenzy, a novel written by Percival Everett, is a rewrite of that story—and the feedback that came with it. The draft I wrote talking about what the novel Frenzy, written by Percival Everett, did to the original Greek tragedy:The Bacchae by Euripides was an accumulation of half-thoroughly executed ideas. I discussed several of the ways in which the plot of The Bacchae was altered in Frenzy, why the changes were made by Percival Everett, and why the changes were significant to literature. I executed the ideas and tried to make them all fit together in my attempt to say that The Bacchae and Frenzy were commented on the power of faith and its effect on human decision. I then proceeded to state how Frenzy emphasized the power of faith through an obscure amount of changes to the plot and characters in The Bacchae; my attempt to incorporate the large amount of changes in the novel led to the creation of an unfocused essay and an improperly executed thesis. The feedback I received urged me to refocus the paper on a single change within the novel.
In my attempt to focus on a single idea within my paper, I applied the feedback to my writing process with the blog posts. With a new approach to writing, I attempted to write another post called: Thoughts on Bias in Discipline Part 1: Bias In The Study Of History—this blog post took me one week to thoroughly complete. Thoughts on Bias in Discipline is an excellent example of the benefits of writing for in preparation for the revision process and appropriately executing single ideas, because the process of writing it resulted in two separate posts commenting on bias within several disciplines (the second post is titled: Thoughts on Bias in Discipline Part 2: The Arts; Should an Artist’s Contribution To Their Art Be Separated From Themselves?). Instead of creating a single unorganized and unfocused post, I was able to utilize two of the ideas I had created when beginning the writing process and appropriately execute the two ideas in their own post through revision. With this I began to write all my blog post with the process of revision in mind—I learned that the writing and revision process would be the most efficient with the focus of one idea, opposed to an attempt at unsuccessfully incorporate all of my ideas.
Eventually, after learning how to focus on a single idea, I cycled back to the origin of my growth: The Bacchae/Frenzy paper, and attempted to rewrite it, ultimately giving me biggest source of my growth with the revision process (All Is One, One Is All; Thanks For The Jazz). In my focus of a particular idea within the essay, I began to perceive different possibilities and theses for the idea. Of all the changes Percival Everett made in his rendition of The Bacchae through his novel Frenzy, I chose to focus on the changes in Kadmos, the former king of Thebes, and his relationships with the other characters, which would ultimately depict the impact of desire on decision making. I was only able to reinterpret my initial thesis through the choice to focus on a single idea—of course, the amount of time I used to develop my writing in between my draft and rewrite were extremely helpful. Once I realized my ability to reinterpret, I was able to apply to all my writing, including the rest of my blog posts (this includes the group blog post I completed: “What’s wrong with your eye?”). With several more blog posts to complete, I was able to properly practice revision and improve the time it took to complete one revision cycle, as well improve my initial writing process—my final blog post took three days. I revised my last blog post several times, and I personally believe Practice What You Preach; a tribute to skateboarding to be one of my best executed posts.
Ultimately, the process of revision enabled my growth as a writer and scholar. The course Reader & Text; Percival Everett served as excellent facilitation for this growth through the series of required blog posts and the final rewrite paper. Through the appropriate practice of revision, which I was enabled through the course, I developed and improved.