S1 Ep7: SHAPING – developing the discipline of editing

The Fearless Writer Podcast with Beth Kempton

In today’s episode we explore how to go from vague idea, or a spilt page of words, to a polished, shaped piece of writing, how to develop the discipline of editing your own work, and to learn to trust your own opinion, and knowing when it’s time to get support from elsewhere. The episode includes:

- How to know when a piece of writing is ‘done enough’

- The main thing you need to know about editing

- How I turn an idea for a book into the actual book (spoiler: I don’t write a ‘first draft’ until very late in the process) – and how this information might help you and your work

With inspiration from John McPhee, Robert M Pirsig and Julie Cadwallader.

I hope this podcast will help you write fearlessly, and with joy, and build a writing practice that nourishes you for the rest of your life. I’d love to see what writing it inspires – feel free to share by tagging me @bethkempton #fearlesswriterpodcast

BethXx

PS Please note there is a chunk of silence in this podcast. It is supposed to be there for the weekly writing exercise!

Click here to download the transcript
The theme music for The Fearless Writer Podcast is The River sung by Danni Nicholls, co-written by Danni Nicholls and me, Beth Kempton. Listen on iTunes / Spotify / Youtube and feel free to add it to your Instagram reels! See here for the lyrics and full credits.

***Did you know the audiobook version of The Way of the Fearless Writer includes a full meditation album to help get the words flowing? You can get it here.

Resources mentioned in this episode:

• From Draft No.4 by John McPhee (Farrar, Straus & Giroux p.180

• On Quality: An inquiry into excellence by Robert M Pirsig (Mariner)

• Blackbirds by Julie Cadwallader Staub in Poetry of Presence by Phyllis Cole-Dai & Ruby R Wilson (Eds.) (pub. Grayson Books) p.50
• The Way of the Fearless Writer by Beth Kempton (Piatkus). US/Canada edition HERE.

My recommendations for books that will help you shape your writing: On Writing Well by William Zinssner / Elements of Style by William Strunk Jr & E.B. White / New Oxford Dictionary for Writers and Editors (Oxford) / The Situation and the Story by Vivian Gornick

More at bethkempton.com / dowhatyouloveforlife.com / Instagram