IWSG: Re-reading early works

 

Its the first Wednesday in February already. That means, time for the Insecure Writers Support Group post. Click here for the IWSG  participant linky and posting details.

This month's co-hosts are: J Lenni Dorner, Victoria Marie Lees, and Sandra Cox. Be sure to visit their blogs and show your IWSG support.

February 4 question - Many writers have written about the experience of rereading their work years later. Have you reread any of your early works? What was that experience like for you?

Yes, I have re-read many of my earlier works. Some of my early work re-reads have sparked new ideas that allowed me to send for publishing. These are usually short stories. Sometimes I read something I put aside, and get ideas to create longer stories. Sometimes I re-read that stuff and get the best laugh I've had in months/years. Like - wow, what sparked that nonsense! And sometimes I re-read and tell myself I can't wait to get back to writing on the project - and it never happens.

Even over the last few years of "not writing" I've revisited several projects, made some editing notes, or actual re-writes. Or just enjoyed reading something I created, even if I did not make any changes (except in my minds eye). I think its a good thing to re-read old projects - I find it helpful to remind myself of how far I've come in my writing journey, but to also remember that I enjoyed the act of creating a story, even if just for myself.

I wrote my first full novella (at the time I thought it was a novel) during high school. It took me about two years to complete. My English teacher read it, and said it was pretty good. He talked to my parents and wanted to enter it into a Children's writing contest of some sort. My parents said no, of course, there would be fees and things they had to agree to. And the book went into a pile of memorabilia. That ended my aspirations at becoming the next Louisa May Alcott.

I don't know why, but I've carried that hand written folder with me all these years (about 50), sometimes forgetting I have it, then finding it again when I'm clearing out old stuff I never look at. Oddly, its never hit the trash bin, though that's always my first instinct. Well, yes it has hit the trash, then I pull it out. When I first started writing again - as an adult with lots of life experience behind me - I re-read it, and thought maybe I should re-write it. But I never have, not even to type it into a computer document.

Its kind of my own secret. Nobody has read it in my family - I don't think so anyways. Everyone knows I have it, but its just my high school thing. And maybe that's why I don't do anything with it. The story defined a period in my childhood, and maybe working on it now, with my adult mind, will take away the innocence of youth, and the dream of a fabulous life after foster care.

The project I'm working on now is sort of a re-read/re-write. I lost it on the computer, but found it in print form. I'm attempting not to make any changes until I get it all in a word document. Data entry first, right?!?

So my own question to you is: do you have anything you kept from your early writing days and re-read just to remind yourself of who you were then, and how far you have come now?