No, this is not a post about language in YA fiction. “Foul matter” is the term, in the biz, for materials like manuscripts, galleys, proofs, etc., that are no longer relevant to the book-making process and get returned to the publisher by the printer. Also, I use it to refer to the piles of papers, notebooks, backs of envelopes, index cards, and Post-Its that were part of my project once upon a time but now have little to no meaning, because the book has changed so much from that first vision.
Here’s a pile of stuff related to The Lucy Variations that I tossed into the recycling bin this this morning:
Sometimes writers save this stuff for “posterity”. I have enjoyed going to special collections and looking at drafts and manuscripts of other authors. And I know there’s a special collection of YA stuff at a college in Florida. I sent some Story of a Girl material, like first pass pages, there a few years ago. But generally, my drafts make me feel so completely exposed, I can’t imagine anyone but my editor and a few trusted friends reading them without feeling like shortly there will be a knock on the door and I’ll be arrested for impersonating a writer. And I’m not sure about the idea of predicting that work will be lasting enough to warrant a record.
Some writers save it for themselves. It’s like keeping baby pictures or something, I guess. But for me, the original material bears so little resemblance to the finished work that it would be more like keeping the pictures of old boyfriends that caused lots of pain. Or, I don’t know, that’s not quite it. I guess, bottom line, it’s about letting go of what I thought the book would be, and accepting what it is.
(I do keep the computer files of past drafts, so I suppose I am keeping a record somehow. Occasionally I pull up excerpts from old drafts to use in a workshop revision talk.)
Writers: What do you do with the paper–if you use paper–related to your process?
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It depends. A paper I wrote ages ago, I SO wish I had the original research source listed that brought me to a particular conclusion (b/c now I’m not sure if it’s correct.) I still have journals from high school. I think it’s one of those things that I don’t have a cut and dried answer on yet.
xo,
SL
Yeah, maybe if there were a set system (like Mieke has, below)…
I keep almost everything I use to to create a project in a dedicated project box. At work, we receive deliveries in document boxes all the time, so I never really have to buy them.
Everything I use for a project, be it handwritten notes, pictures cut out of magazines, printed drafts, etc. go into that box. I even make a back-up copy of any electronic files relating to the project on a CD Rom and keep it in the box. It helps keep me organized, but sometimes they also remind me of coffins for my projects. Hmmm… Maybe I should re-think this.
I kind of like that idea of an archival SYSTEM for yourself, that isn’t just random stacks of paper. In fact, as much as I’m trying to declutter my life, I may adopt this. I actually like the idea of burning all the files to a disk and storing that, then deleting them from my computer…
I toss the last draft when the latest one arrives. (Line edits get recycled as soon as copy edits come in. Copy edits go when I get page proofs…) These days I have most drafts electronically anyway.
I have piles of folders all about on the floor behind my chair and note cards strewn everywhere for my WIP (115k novel) I just decided a week ago to write in a new character from page one. The cards stuck to the wall with masking tape look pretty official, but most need updating. I have to admit, I’m probably paddling in circles, but still, I must be making waves too. No, it’s not circles, it’s orbits.
Sounds amazing. I can’t wait to be able to do that with my manuscript, because it will mean I’m done.
There’s so much paper everywhere. My room is a huge mess. Unfortunately, I’m afraid to scrap things until the draft doesn’t remotely resemble that section anymore. So I can only throw things out every couple months.
Even then, I cut out the good comments I got from classes and critique groups and make a little scrapbook out of it. It’s a good compromise because I have a propensity towards hoarding sentimental keepsakes, but I don’t want to drown in paper.
I don’t really have enough books under my belt to talk about this, but I do have a box for KtMS and a box for another finished novel and I suppose someday I’ll put all this junk from my WIP into another box. I’m super disorganized with this, so I’ll have notes from several novels in the same journal, which is dumb but it’s the way life happens to me.
Oh! But my manuscripts that my editor has written on (she did everything with pencil on hard copy), I often bring those in to my students to show them that yes, you can revise even if what you have is pretty solid. And yes, sometimes you can revise multiple times (they are always shocked and appalled at how many tries it took me to go from the ms. that I sold to the finished book…I think they believe me to be rather stupid!)
It makes me nervous even to READ about your throwing those papers away! But then that’s a big problem I have with life’s detritus in general. It feels like throwing ME away, but sometimes that’s a good thing.
I just tossed all my journals from the last 5 years because I do think that sometimes it’s good to throw ME away!
I keep my first draft, but I tend to throw the middle drafts away. I just keep the first draft so I can see how much the book has changed once I’m finished. Then again, if I kept all the in-between drafts, I wouldn’t have any space in my workspace for anything else and you be seeing me on an episode of Hoarders!
I handwrite a lot of my first drafts in notebooks, like Moleskine or Leuchtturm, and I am fond of looking at those stacks of notebooks and thinking: yes, see I have been doing work! Even though it feels like I’ve produced absolutely nothing! Also what I write is so random sometimes that I can go back to those old notebooks, open them anywhere, and find some good idea (or at least: idea) that I never used. Or if not an idea, then anyway a reminder that I was at least as miserable and lost then as I am now, and whatever I was writing back then got finished. But the odd post-its and index cards get tossed (unless they have something useful-seeming, in which case tucked into a notebook).
I have used the box method ever since I read about it in Twyla Tharp’s “The Creative Habit.” Maybe it’s my archivist mother’s training, or maybe it’s some inner pack-rattery, but I can’t bring myself to throw the stuff away. The box helps me keep all project materials and drafts organized so that if I ever want to revisit something, no matter how wince-making it might be, I am able to find it.