why revision is hard

A Google search for "why revision is hard" led a browser here a few weeks ago--I really wonder what they were hoping to find! I was thinking about this today because I'm really tired after my intensive two days of revision on a document that is only twelve pages long. Part of what is hard is the fact that I worked for two days and it is still twelve pages long.

When we are learning to compose papers, there is a lot of emphasis, from students and teachers, on filling up pages. Papers are defined by how long they are, and progress is measured by how many pages you've written. So to work so hard on something but have no more PAGES to show for it is hard to take--it doesn't feel like progress in the way we have learned to see it. Even at a high academic level, even as an experienced writer and a teacher of writing, something remains of that idea of pages = progress. (And I have to tack on that this is relevant to understanding the difference between composing traditional papers and electronic or other media documents and how it is hard for a lot of people to move from one to the other.)

Another difficulty is that revision necessitates cutting, sometimes large amounts of text, sometimes words that you are especially attached to. My friend (I know you're reading this!) reminded me of some advice we got recently and that she has put to use. Have a "dump file" to go along with every document you produce, copy and paste everything you cut, and then date it and save it. Then your words are not deleted and you don't have the anxiety of losing something that might be valuable later or throwing away something that you have created. And maybe that would help allay the sense of moving backwards.

And revision is also hard because it requires a lot of thought work, and people (inside and outside the academy) too often fail to recognize that as real work.