Tough Skin

One of the things I was really looking forward to about India was being edited. When you’re a writer, you need tough skin; you need to be able to take harsh criticism with grace, and an open mind. I came here hoping to develop some calluses.

Imagine labouring for a hours and hours on a document, handing it to Sohayl, and getting it back almost completely covered in yellow – the bits he doesn’t like – and red – his additions/changes. In the beginning it was very painful, but I tried to take it with an almost masochistic smile, knowing that I was toughening my skin.

Now a days I’ve gotten almost used to writing three or four completely different versions of a chapter and then editing the best one until I can barely pick out my own sentences, from Sohayl’s and our hybrid bits. Now a days, I feel happy if I find a paragraph of mine intact when the chapter is done.

Part of the reason why it takes two or three drafts is my own poor writing, but part of it is also just the process. Usually Sohayl and I talk a bit about what is needed in the chapter, and then I write something. After reading it we realize that we either had different views of what needed to be in the lesson, or that there is a better way to do it.

I have to say that while the process is enlightening, and enjoyable in its own way, it is very constraining. I’m used to writing novels, which means I have over three hundred pages to go in depth into whatever I want to say, to cover all the angles, and subtly develop the points. Furthermore there’s no age restraint, no need to pull any punches, or make things ‘nice’. In a book which will be taught in schools to young teenagers you can’t really cover issues in a gritty way, which is the way I tend to want to portray things. But even this is a useful constraint, because in my writing career I’ll undoubtedly have to compromise.