Kill Your Darlings

First attempt:
‘Kill your darlings’ or ‘Murder your darlings’ is an often repeated piece of writing advice. Its precise origins are uncertain; it has been attributed to almost every successful author of the 20th Century including Chekov, Oscar Wilde, Eudora Weldy and William Faulkner. Its earliest appearance in print was actually in the work of Sir Arthur Quiller Couch. Although often taken to mean the literal killing off of characters, its true power and meaning is more accurately interpreted as removing from your writing anything that does not serve the reader. To quote Stephen King, ‘kill your darlings, kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.’ Editing out passages that are self-indulgent, sops to your intellectual ego…

Second attempt:
‘Kill your darlings’ or ‘Murder your darlings’ is an often repeated piece of writing advice. Although often taken to mean the literal killing off of characters, its true power and meaning is unlocked when interpreted as removing from your writing anything that does not serve the reader.
Picture the writer, sat at his (or her) desk, so invested in telling a story to the reader, using all the lessons hard learned at the keyboard to convey a message and yet they go astray. They have wandered from the point of the piece, they are no longer advancing the narrative, they are simply writing prose that obscures or stands alone from the true meanin…

Third attempt:
‘Kill your darlings’ or ‘Murder your darlings’ is an often repeated piece of writing advice. Although often taken to mean the literal killing off of characters, its true power and meaning is often discovered when interpreted as removing from your writing anything that does not serve the reader. It can often be found in those unconscious choices, repeated concepts, phrases or even words that are often selected, that are often invisible to the write…

Fourth attempt:
‘Kill your darlings’ or ‘Murder your darlings’ is a frequently repeated piece of writing advice. Although commonly taken to mean the literal killing off of characters, its true power and meaning is liberated when interpreted as removing from your writing anything that does not serve the reader. Above all, writing should be tight.

“So the writer who breeds more words than he needs, is making a chore for the reader who reads.” Dr Seuss

“Put down everything that comes into your head and then you're a writer. But an author is one who can judge his own stuff's worth, without pity, and destroy most of it.” Sidonie Gabrielle Collet...

Final attempt:
Kill your darlings.