Linda Rogers, poet laureate of Victoria, B.C., is not only a poet but also a novelist, teacher and journalist. She says on her website that “[a]s we get closer and more competitive in the crowded world, we are discovering that we need liturgies for living. That is the poet’s job description, as I see it.” I’m delighted to have her on Poetic Edits:
How do you work your way through revisions? Do you have any tricks or theories to removing commas, words or lines?
I once said that I write the way I bake, by throwing in the ingredients without measuring.Now I understand the chemistry of bread, cookies and cakes, pie crust even. It is by feel. Writing is somewhat similar, but there is the tendency to throw in too much.For me editing is more about taking away than adding. I find the narrative bubbles up with its attendant spirits ( images, music) but there is usually too much. I have no tricks. Editing is the hard work part. Occasionally I get to throw in a few rasins or chocolate chips, but mostly I cut the fat.
That takes a ruthless and patient nature.
The only trick I can throw out is to LISTEN to what you have written. The clunkers like to announce themsleves, brazen little things. READ ALOUD and you will be shocked by the excess.
Robert Lowell wrote that “Revision is inspiration.” To what extent do you think that’s true? How would you rewrite Lowell: “Revision is __________”
Revision is the Pilates of writing. It makes your abs ache but gives a better shape.
Any pet peeves when it comes to editing your own work or someone else’s?
I hate it when an editor visits his own deficits on me i.e. suggesting revisions that have absolutely no relevance to my voice or that sound flat except to his tin ear.
A good editor asks questions and makes you do the work. I try to do the same.
Some people don’t NEED editors. They are already gods attached to the notion that their nose blowings are art.
Are there any lines from an early draft of a poem that you’d like to share? What ideas, principles or gut feelings guided you through those changes?
I can’t remember the process of early poems.That was too long ago. I don’t even remember last week. I do know that I won’t write a poem that doesn’t already have its own integrity. I see myself as a reporter. The story is there. I cannot force or change it. I can only follow its narrative arc to the end to the best of my ability, bringing everything I know and feel to the moment it is written and continuing to sculpt it with the respect I feel it deserves.