The last week or so has been devoted to reworking the manuscript of I Truly Lament Working Through the Holocaust. The editor forwarded the text with a slew of deletions, revisions, and even rephrasing of the content, all listed on the right side of the pages. Jane who is much more conversant with computer tech and much more savvy than I, deciphered the edits and incorporated them into the manuscript. It was my task then to read all 229 pages and spot typos, awkward sentences and the like. Here and there I deleted a sentence or two and replaced them with clearer sentences. (I had written “legated” which escaped the word check. I had meant the surgical term “ligated.”) I compare this kind of fine tune editing as removing “lint” from the manuscript.
Even now, Jane is rereading the text for a final go through with her critical eyes and she has informed me there are some things I have to attend to. We will confer on changes she thinks to be made or lack of clarity in some of my prose. The saving grace of all this is that the stories seem to hold up; they may or may not be good but at least their defects will be observed in clear-cut and error free prose. That is all I can ask.
What was really gratifying was to be informed by the editor: “I hope all this is helpful. Again, with the exception above, there was very little to change.” [Double WOW]
When I had This Mobius Strip of Ifs edited by David Herrle, he educated me as to sequencing, the subtle editor’s craft of placing stories in such a way that they play off one another, or are grouped together in terms of similar themes, or situated in terms of balance. Since the present book consists of 27 stories dealing with varying aspects of the Holocaust, the ordering of the stories was significant. The editor sent suggestions such as this: “Consider moving ‘The Indifferent Golem’ up so it’s not right next to ‘Golem, I need Your Help.’” And I did so. Advice was helpful. And she wrote, “Keep ‘The Disenchanted Golem’ as the final story. The question it raises sums up a great deal of the book, and it’s difficult and hopeful at the same time. It’s also possibly my favorite.” Of course I am a needy writer and to hear that made me very pleased, however, I really didn’t mean to do that, proving that the writer is the last to know. Consequently, I suppose, the rationale for having editors.
As to sequencing, she notes: “If you decide to reorder anything, or if you decide to include your additional stories, emotional variation is key. You don’t want the darkest stories side by side. Too much misery all at once and readers may either stop reading or become calloused as a means of self-defense. Give them a little respite, and they may be more open to the worst experiences your characters go through.”
Thus, sequencing! But will this happen to another book on the Holocaust, mine. Has the collective unconscious become “calloused” to Shoah?
While all this was moving forward, I received a foreword from novelist Duff Brenna who had published two of the book’s stories in his online Serving House Journal. It is a stellar endorsement and at the end he writes:
“In its totality Freese’s haunting lament might best be explained (at least to me) by something Nathaniel Hawthorne wrote about Herman Melville’s endless search for answers to questions that perplexed him all his adult life. Melville was incessantly obsessed with what one might call the why of it all—life, death, metaphysical mysteries. Similar to Freese, Melville was repeatedly afflicted with a dark and depressive state of mind.”
I can’t ask for better, one hell of an assessment. I am also waiting for another endorsement from poet and editor David Herrle which I should have in a few weeks. These two endorsements will make up the back cover. And Brenna informed me that he will publish the foreword itself in the fall issue of Serving House Journal — that might create a ripple in time.
Meanwhile Jane will finish her final reading of the book this week and by week’s end I hope to send the production manager a PDF of our corrections. When she has them in hand she will format the text and send back a copy for me to do a final edit. It is this edit that I will sign off on. Hopefully the summer will be spent on choosing a cover and dealing with annoying details that always crop up. At the same time I will be searching out bloggers, reviewers, Jewish studies programs, Jewish reference librarians, and Jewish museums that I can query for adoption or purchase. I will devote a year to the book, promoting it, pushing it, whatever I can do for I believe it is special.
Jane has spent at least two days rereading 227 pages and has informed me that some of the stories need to have sections deleted for they are too long , windy or repetitious. That I need to cut out and delete makes for anxiety in me, for no doubt when I have reread some of the stories I felt they were much too long but I went into denial. I have to remind myself over and over again to draw the line not on a single sentence or even a paragraph or two. I have to consider the total work as a whole and whether or not deletions might support the axiom that less is more. In revision less is always better.
So this Saturday I will sit next to Jane at the computer and we will diligently go over her notes and cut when we can. That is not as simple as it seems, but we will try our best, although I get my writer temper up when Jane and I disagree, for her mind obviously sees things differently than mine. Hopefully on Sunday we will forward the revised PDF to my publisher. The grace note is that I will get a proof back that I can go over once more, and more, and more, before I sign off on it.
I believe all good books are made in revision.
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