{"id":284131,"date":"2018-09-14T16:19:09","date_gmt":"2018-09-14T16:19:09","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/2018\/09\/14\/marta-bee-notagarroter-not-poignant-tiny\/"},"modified":"2018-09-14T16:19:09","modified_gmt":"2018-09-14T16:19:09","slug":"marta-bee-notagarroter-not-poignant-tiny","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.merindab.com\/private\/2018\/09\/14\/marta-bee-notagarroter-not-poignant-tiny\/","title":{"rendered":""},"content":{"rendered":"

marta-bee<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

notagarroter<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

not-poignant<\/a>:<\/p>\n

\n

Tiny post. <\/p>\n

I sometimes get asked how to find betas and I\u2019ve written posts about that in the past.<\/a><\/p>\n

But I think it\u2019s worth noting that most – MOST – fanfiction writers don\u2019t have betas <\/i>and are doing pretty damn well without them. They won\u2019t be putting \u2018unbetaed\u2019 in their tags or notes, and they just\u2026don\u2019t have \u2018em. <\/p>\n

It\u2019s an absolutely normal part of the fanfiction process for the majority of writers. <\/i>So if you feel like you\u2019re doing something \u2018Wrong\u2019 because you\u2019re just starting out without a beta, you\u2019re not. Or it\u2019s been a few years and you don\u2019t have a beta. Or it\u2019s been your entire fanfiction life and you don\u2019t want a beta, <\/i>you\u2019re doing fine. Tbh, many writers pick up betas through acquisition – they\u2019ve written so much that eventually one of their readers either offers, or they talk to a reader about it and that\u2019s how that happens. And that\u2019s why it is so hard to find betas, because the most common form of \u2018acquiring a beta\u2019 is just \u2018I was writing for so long without one that eventually I had a regular reader who had a really good eye and seemed to like what I do so now they beta my work.\u2019 <\/p>\n

Basically if you\u2019re writing fanfiction without a beta or editor you\u2019re doing nothing wrong, you\u2019re great, and you\u2019re super valid and awesome. You\u2019re not even on the road less travelled, you\u2019re on \u2018the road most people are travelling on.\u2019\u00a0<\/p>\n

*<\/p>\n

Brought to you by the: Tired of seeing people try to bring professional writing rules to fanfiction – especially ones specifically that make it very hard to write, or that impose forced rules of interaction, or that shame – when fanfiction is specifically about tossing a lot of those rules anarchistically in the trash so that people can have fun \/ enjoy a hobby.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

co-sign!<\/p>\n

I\u2019m a professional writer of fiction and when I write professionally, I have colleagues and editors and copyeditors and proofreaders who go through everything I publish at various stages to make it the best (or most marketable, anyway) it can be.<\/p>\n

when I write fanfic, I say fuck all that. this is for fun, this is for me, and I really don\u2019t care if it\u2019s perfect as long as I had fun with it.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

Agree with all this. I mean, I enjoy workign with a beta because it makes me more confident, but I also enjoy just writing the thing and putting it out there.<\/p>\n

At the same time, I realize I\u2019m more experienced and confident than some. So if you\u2019re struggling with how to actually write without an editor, if it makes you nervous or you still are driven to put out the best work you can (because you want to, not out of shame or obligation), I thought I\u2019d share my three rules for self-editing. I taught intro philosophy courses when in grad school, so I\u2019ve shepherded hundreds of students through one of their first college-level papers, and I guarantee you,\u00a0\u201cself-edited meta\u201d was the gold standard most of them couldn\u2019t reach. These seemed to help them just get on with it already.<\/p>\n

    \n
  1. Read it out loud<\/b>. Especially if you\u2019re a native English speaker, what \u201cseems\u201d right usually works better than memorizing rhetorical\/grammatical rul<\/li>\n
  2. Leave it be for a while. <\/b>Set your draft aside. Take a few hours – walk the dog, grab a Starbucks, do the laundry. Often enough, when you come back to it you\u2019ll have fresh eyes and a much more creative frame of mind. Plus you\u2019ll be reading your work more like a writer, not like someone sweating bullets over the finnicky details.<\/li>\n
  3. Just stop it already. <\/b>In my experience, after about 3-4 edits you start seeing what you expect to be there and not what you\u2019ve actually written. Even if it still doesn\u2019t seem quite right, I\u2019ll stop the whole tweaking cycle once I get to that point.<\/li>\n<\/ol>\n

    As I said, this is mainly for people nervous about putting their work out there, or for people who are driven to make their fic the best it can be because that\u2019s what they want. If it works for you, great. If not, that\u2019s reason enough to chuck it in the rubbish. As the OP said, this is meant to be fun.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

    marta-bee: notagarroter: not-poignant: Tiny post. I sometimes get asked how to find betas and I\u2019ve written posts about that in the past. But I think it\u2019s worth noting that most – MOST – fanfiction writers don\u2019t have betas and are doing pretty damn well without them. They won\u2019t be putting \u2018unbetaed\u2019 in their tags or … <\/p>\n

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