‘One day when I was twenty-three or twenty-four this sentence
seemed to form in my head, without my willing it, much as sentences form when
we are half-asleep, ‘Hammer your thoughts into unity’. For days I
could think of nothing else and for years I tested all I did by that sentence
[...]” William Butler Yeats (cited in Frank Tuohy, Yeats 1976, p.51 )
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Revising is discovery learning,
especially when you
HAMMER YOUR THOUGHTS INTO UNITY
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Paris Review: How much rewriting do you do?
Hemingway: It depends. I rewrote the ending to A Farewell To Arms, the last page of it, thirty-nine times before I was satisfied.
Paris Review: Was there some technical problem there? What was it that stumped you?
Hemingway: Getting the words right
1a. You must add at least 350 words of new material in your revisions of P1A and P2A (even if you thought you had already done so). This new material is a "test" of whether or not you have used discovery learning to avoid the errors and infelicities of the previous essays. The 350 or more new words can be all in one unit or scattered throughout, but, like all your other changes, it must be highlighted somehow, by underlining or font changes or highlighting with a color pen, or ….. And of course your final word count must reflect this change. It should be 350 words higher unless you cut some material: if you did cut some, note how many words were cut after the word count. Bonus points will be given for more than 350 words of new material if it is integral to the project.
As
for what to add, that is up to you, but consult the suggestions from your
readers. 1b.
Do not just “correct errors” or "infelicities" that I have marked:
the idea is to improve all your
sentences. (see Hemingway's comments above.)
1c. Never just delete a
troubled phrase, fragment, or sentence, unless “economy” is specified as
the problem. Do not write around the problem: tackle it directly. You learn
nothing by avoiding the learning process. Find a better word, phrase, or
sentence. Penalty for just deleting or writing around words marked for change:
-10 pts. each occurrence.
2.
As you rewrite your projects, remember the emphasis on place.
Hammer your thoughts into unity by returning again and again to this subject. Significant
bonus points will be awarded for increases in unity and signs of real thinking.
An obvious way to unify is to have first and last paragraphs on the relation
of your topic to place and keep referring to it throughout. If the relation
of your topic to place is not readily apparent, you have a chance to explore
the relationship between discovery learning and rewriting.
Notations:
-If
you add a lot of new material in one unit you can just draw a vertical highlight
in margin rather than highlighting each sentence.
-If
you omit a word just highlight the spot and write "word(s) omitted" in
the margin.
