Why "Kill your darlings"?

[TvT Rivals]

Yes, it's an old advice. Yes, many famous authors have said so. And still, there's a nagging doubt... why exactly is this so bad?

We don't say it's all wrong. We just don't see how this is proven for all time.

We want to explain our reasoning behind this. There are enough books (and nowadays, blogs and other websites) for writing, like this one. We've read many of them. But this particular question, they couldn't answer. Not in a way that was satisfying to us.

You can find many kinds of advice in these texts. Many of these are obvious (get your grammar right; a big vocabulary helps; research your topic; etc.)

"Kill your darlings" isn't that obviously true. How do we know so? We think this advice should be tested. There are many badfics out there which prove that other rules are there for a reason: If you break them, your story probably sucks.

If "Kill your darlings" is a useful advice, it should be possible to falsify it. If someone decided to deliberately break it, the resulting story should be obviously bad.

So this is the challenge: Where do we find a story where the author didn't kill his darlings, but on the contrary, raised and spoiled them rotten, so to speak? Is there a story like that out there, and if yes, where?

Hope you like our challenge.

[Morganite]

(Should this be moved OPF? That's where most of the general writing discussions have been.)

Anyway, the first question that has to be asked is what the hell that saying even means. I've seen a version that goes more like "No matter how cool something is, if including it will make your story worse, then don't include it." Under this definition, what you're asking seems essentially impossible.

Of course "worse" does not mean the story automatically becomes bad, either. And what's wrong for one story may find a home elsewhere. The extreme example of this would be that book by John Ringo that he wrote to get stuff that would screw up his other stories out of his head, but then people wanted to read it. (Not that there's not argument about how good or bad it is, but "contains the kind of stuff that it was made to be about" is not really a meaningful flaw, and it's not like it's claiming to be highbrow entertainment.)

On the other hand, there's another interpretation that sounds more like "If you really loved writing a scene, delete it." Which sounds like a good way to become a bad writer to me. How often is someone who does that actually going to get published?

There are many badfics out there which prove that other rules are there for a reason: If you break them, your story probably sucks.

Though I also find this somewhat flawed. Great stories regularly break rules, and not breaking rules is no guarantee of a good story.

-Morgan.

[DHBirr]

Morganite wrote:

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On the other hand, there's another interpretation that sounds more like "If you really loved writing a scene, delete it." Which sounds like a good way to become a bad writer to me. How often is someone who does that actually going to get published?

Similarly, there's that famous line, Samuel Johnson claiming to be quoting someone else, about going through whatever you've written and if you come to "a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out."  Following that strictly has always struck me as a recipe for bland writing.
As for TvT Rivals' question, though, I'm drawing a blank at present.

I will suggest, though, that it's an absolute prescription, and "only the Sith deal in absolutes."  
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Big Brother is watching you.  And damn, you are so bloody BORING.

[Bob Schroeck]

First: This really does belong in OPF, where we have threads on writing and being a writer. I'll move it in a moment, and leave a "shadow" behind so folks know where it is.,

Second: I don't have the time to muse on the challenge and see if I can think of a good answer. I know of several works that were created to mock or exploit the way publishing works, and one might fit, but I can't spare the time right now.
-- Bob
---------
Then the horns kicked in...
...and my shoes began to squeak.

[ECSNorway]

There's a saying in 18xx games that this reminds me of: "Date the stock, don't marry it."

The meaning I take from this is, don't get too attached to your own cleverness.

So, who has done this sort of thing?

Mmmm. I think of authors who have outgrown their editors, like Tom Clancy and David Weber.
--
Sucrose Octanitrate.
Proof positive that with sufficient motivation, you can make anything explode.

[Norgarth]

George Lucas in the Star Wars Prequels.   Midaclorians may have seemed really cool to him, to the audience less so.
___________________________
"I've always wanted to be somebody, but I should have been more specific." - George Carlin

[Morganite]

Similarly, there's that famous line, Samuel Johnson claiming to be quoting someone else, about going through whatever you've written and if you come to "a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out."  Following that strictly has always struck me as a recipe for bland writing.

There's something that seems strangely paradoxical about it. Is an author's tastes assumed to be so different from their readers'? Shouldn't it be more the opposite, where the author thinking they just did something cool there is a positive sign? Liking the stuff you come up with is why your fans became your fans in the first place.

-Morgan.

[Jinx999]

I interpret it as "Don't fall in love with your writing."
Last time I wrote fanfic, I spent considerable time thinking about world building, the backgrounds and personalities of secondary characters and interesting scenes.
Very little of this made it into the finished fanfic, because it was irrelevent to the story, boring info dumps or would have taken focus away from the central story.
You have to be objective about your writing and willing to prune harshly.

[Star Ranger4]

Certainly the above interpretations are correct, but my take on it is that "You have to go through hell to get to heaven".

It refers to the belief that great stories are about people facing a challenge of some sort and overcoming it; many feel that the more daunting the obstacle, the more satisfaction is found in the accomplishment. Ergo, the harsher you are to your protagonists, the more roadblocks they overcome along the way the more the readers cheer for them when they do. Assuming that you've been doing your job right and your readers are empathising with your protagonist.
Hear that thunder rolling till it seems to split the sky?
That's every ship in Grayson's Navy taking up the cry-
NO QUARTER!!!
-- "No Quarter", by Echo's Children

[Rajvik]

there will come a time in BROB'd, before the character reaches FoZ, indeed before he even reaches NGE that he's going to fall in love and take the other character with him through the multiverse with him. This is going to get her killed either in the next world or the one after that, i haven't decided which yet. the building of the romance is going to be a big story between the character and the leading six of FoZ and her death, (as well as the responsibility angst the character feels over her death) is the main reason he doesn't want to ever take anyone with him when he jumps worlds anymore. Sorry but stealing the idea from F&F6 only the character doesn't get to go home but has to go on through various worlds.
 

[Morganite]

Certainly the above interpretations are correct, but my take on it is that "You have to go through hell to get to heaven".

Frankly, I have some objections with what you're describing in this reply, but I'm pretty sure that'd be a discussion for another thread. This isn't about what you do to your characters, it's about what you do to your paragraphs.

-Morgan.

[Acyl]

The quote can mean different things to different people. As Morgan's pointed out, it's probably important to clarify that it doesn't literally refer to killing off characters. It CAN refer to killing characters, yeah. But it's more than that.

It means you should be willing to discard any element of your writing if it makes the story better. And you should be willing to do that even if you're attached to it. That could be a character, yes. Or it could be sentences, paragraphs, chapters. It could be a concept, it could be a piece of imagery, it could be some aspect of the plot... whatever.

As for how true it is, well, that depends.

I broadly agree with the sentiment, in the sense that I feel there's always something that can be done to improve a piece of writing. There's got to be some way to streamline it, to bring the point across more clearly, to get to the point sooner, and so on. Typically that's going to mean cutting some material, and if so, well, so be it. Sacrifices need to be made.

Or to put it another way - think of it like this. Most of us would probably accept the idea that...no matter how good a writer you are, there's always a benefit in having a second pair of eyes, someone else to edit your work. And very often that editor or proofreader is going to suggest deleting or rephrasing stuff that you yourself would not have changed. Because they're coming at it from an external, objective, perspective.

At the same time, the aim of this exercise is to make the final piece of writing better. It's to enable the finished product to convey its core message, core idea, or...whatever the point is...with greater clarity and impact.

And by definition, that core message, core idea, or the central narrative... that's going to be one of your darlings. So it's not so much that you're lining up everything you're attached to and gunning them all down mercilessly. It's more that you're deciding which one is the favoured child, then you're brutally assassinating every possible challenger to the throne so there's no question on the rightful succession.
Is that always necessary, though?

Well.
Can we find a good story where the author didn't kill their darlings? At least in my mind, that'd be a story where the author's gone on record saying they had a particular...singular aim or objective with the work they were producing...and yet they knowingly introduced or retained elements in the work that contradicted or don't support the central aim, because they were also attached to those secondary elements.

Take Terry Pratchett's Discworld. The earliest Discworld novels were primarily intended to poke fun at high fantasy tropes. He's said that, he's made that clear. But the books also had other elements that eventually came to dominate the series - the idea of extending the infrastructural and social mechanics of a fantasy setting to encompass 21st century modernity, using it as a lens to comment on contemporary culture, and so on.

I think there's quite a lot of fiction out there where the initial book, initial episodes, films, whatever were created with XYZ goal in mind, but follow-up installments have gone places that ended up being very different, building on elements in the initial work that weren't strictly critical to the original aim. And we wouldn't have those things if their creator had been laser-focused on only delivering their initial central message, and nothing else.

EDIT: grammar fixes. derp.
-- Acyl

[robkelk]

The quote can mean different things to different people. As Morgan's pointed out, it's probably important to clarify that it doesn't literally refer to killing off characters. It CAN refer to killing characters, yeah. But it's more than that.

It means you should be willing to discard any element of your writing if it makes the story better. And you should be willing to do that even if you're attached to it. That could be a character, yes. Or it could be sentences, paragraphs, chapters. It could be a concept, it could be a piece of imagery, it could be some aspect of the plot... whatever.

...

Exactly. And it doesn't matter how good the writing is - if it's out of place in the story, it needs to go.

Let's assume for an example that I'm writing a side-story to a well-known fanfic. I've written a beautiful death scene - one that I'm sure would be praised for decades if I publish it. However, that fanfic is Nobody Dies, so a death scene - no matter how well-written - is completely out of place. Kill that darling, and let whoever I was going to kill off continue living in-story. (But keep that scene for a different story.)
--
Rob Kelk
"Governments have no right to question the loyalty of those who oppose
them. Adversaries remain citizens of the same state, common subjects of
the same sovereign, servants of the same law."

- Michael Ignatieff, addressing Stanford University in 2012

[batzulger]

Certainly the above interpretations are correct, but my take on it is that "You have to go through hell to get to heaven".

It refers to the belief that great stories are about people facing a challenge of some sort and overcoming it; many feel that the more daunting the obstacle, the more satisfaction is found in the accomplishment. Ergo, the harsher you are to your protagonists, the more roadblocks they overcome along the way the more the readers cheer for them when they do. Assuming that you've been doing your job right and your readers are empathising with your protagonist.

No you don't. Angst and/or torture of your characters is absolutely not necessary to have an engaging story. It's more often writers being lazy and not coming up with another method to engage the reader. I'm not saying make it easy on the characters, but anguish for the sake of manipulation is not good writing.

--------------------------------
Je ne suis pas une Intelligence Artificielle Turing. Je suis Charlie.

[TvT Rivals]

You made some good points here, and we're sorry we can't give all of you a detailed answer right now. But we definitely don't want to drop this discussion. Some of what you said would fit into a text about advises for writers...

[TvT Rivals]

I've seen a version that goes more like "No matter how cool something is, if including it will make your story worse, then don't include it." Under this definition, what you're asking seems essentially impossible.

So it's more about being able to decide what makes a story actually worse?

"a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out." Following that strictly has always struck me as a recipe for bland writing.

We'd rather agree with you than with whomever Johnson's quoting. Maybe the quote makes more sense in context, although we can't prove it.

The meaning I take from this is, don't get too attached to your own cleverness.

You're up to something there. A few concrete examples would help, though.

You have to be objective about your writing and willing to prune harshly.

Yes, that's good advice... but the devil is in the details.

the harsher you are to your protagonists, the more roadblocks they overcome along the way the more the readers cheer for them when they do. Assuming that you've been doing your job right and your readers are empathising with your protagonist.

That's good advice too, it just doesn't fit the topic.

@Acyl: Very good post. Yes, a good proofreader is worth a lot. The big question: Where to find that proofreader? Often, it's hard enough to find one author who has all the necessary knowledge for a certain story, let alone two. And then there's the question whether they can work together well.

And it doesn't matter how good the writing is - if it's out of place in the story, it needs to go.

Let's assume for an example that I'm writing a side-story to a well-known fanfic. I've written a beautiful death scene - one that I'm sure would be praised for decades if I publish it. However, that fanfic is Nobody Dies, so a death scene - no matter how well-written - is completely out of place. Kill that darling, and let whoever I was going to kill off continue living in-story. (But keep that scene for a different story.)

See, that's a good example. (And we want to read this scene now.)

[Black Aeronaut]

I've been holding off on commenting on this because, to be honest, I'm very adverse to this sort of thing.

I mean, sure, you need to prune your writing judiciously - and there's nothing wrong with taking the editorial knife to your creations. Folks around here know I've done that on more than a few occasions, even going as far as outright rewriting them all over again.

But the thing I hate the most is killing a character in-story. It has always struck me as a very cheap way of trying to drive up the drama factor. Hell, I don't even like killing 'villains' half the time. Really, I think it's far more interesting to see them beaten down, but not killed, only to have them come back and be beaten down... repeat one or two more times until something happens; a character development that causes them to have that all-important heel-face-turn moment.

Even worse are stories where it seems the only point is to kill off as many characters as possible. I can't even stomach such stories as I'm highly empathetic and prone to depression. Really, if I want to feel bad for someone, I'll go get the Old Testament and read about Job.

[Lubaf]

DHBirr wrote:

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Morganite wrote:

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On the other hand, there's another interpretation that sounds more like "If you really loved writing a scene, delete it." Which sounds like a good way to become a bad writer to me. How often is someone who does that actually going to get published?

Similarly, there's that famous line, Samuel Johnson claiming to be quoting someone else, about going through whatever you've written and if you come to "a passage which you think is particularly fine, strike it out."  Following that strictly has always struck me as a recipe for bland writing.

Sorry for reviving this thread, but just to point out: Johnson was talking in a time of rampant Purple Prose, and saying it of what he viewed as a really Purplely Author.
The exact quote, and context:

Goldsmith being mentioned; JOHNSON. 'It is amazing how little Goldsmith
knows. He seldom comes where he is not more ignorant than any one else.'
SIR JOSHUA REYNOLDS. 'Yet there is no man whose company is more liked.'
JOHNSON. 'To be sure, Sir. When people find a man of the most
distinguished abilities as a writer, their inferiour while he is with
them, it must be highly gratifying to them. What Goldsmith comically
says of himself is very true,—he always gets the better when he argues
alone; meaning, that he is master of a subject in his study, and can
write well upon it; but when he comes into company, grows confused, and
unable to talk[692]. Take him as a poet, his Traveller is a very fine
performance; ay, and so is his Deserted Village, were it not sometimes
too much the echo of his Traveller. Whether, indeed, we take him as a
poet,—as a comick writer,—or as an historian, he stands in the first
class.' BOSWELL. 'An historian! My dear Sir, you surely will not rank
his compilation of the Roman History with the works of other historians
of this age?' JOHNSON. 'Why, who are before him[693]?' BOSWELL. 'Hume,—
Robertson[694],—Lord Lyttelton.' JOHNSON (his antipathy to the Scotch
beginning to rise). 'I have not read Hume; but, doubtless, Goldsmith's
History is better than the verbiage of Robertson[695], or the foppery
of Dalrymple[696].' BOSWELL. 'Will you not admit the superiority of
Robertson, in whose History we find such penetration—such painting?'
JOHNSON. 'Sir, you must consider how that penetration and that painting
are employed. It is not history, it is imagination. He who describes
what he never saw, draws from fancy. Robertson paints minds as Sir
Joshua paints faces in a history-piece: he imagines an heroic
countenance. You must look upon Robertson's work as romance, and try it
by that standard[697].History it is not. Besides, Sir, it is the great
excellence of a writer to put into his book as much as his book will
hold. Goldsmith has done this in his History. Now Robertson might have
put twice as much into his book. Robertson is like a man who has packed
gold in wool: the wool takes up more room than the gold. No, Sir; I
always thought Robertson would be crushed by his own weight,—would be
buried under his own ornaments. Goldsmith tells you shortly all you want
to know: Robertson detains you a great deal too long. No man will read
Robertson's cumbrous detail a second time; but Goldsmith's plain
narrative will please again and again. I would say to Robertson what an
old tutor of a college said to one of his pupils: "Read over your
compositions, and where ever you meet with a passage which you think is
particularly fine, strike it out." Goldsmith's abridgement is better
than that of Lucius Florus or Eutropius; and I will venture to say, that
if you compare him with Vertot[698], in the same places of the Roman
History, you will find that he excels Vertot. Sir, he has the art of
compiling, and of saying every thing he has to say in a pleasing
manner[699]. He is now writing a Natural History and will make it as
entertaining as a Persian Tale.'
I cannot dismiss the present topick without observing, that it is
probable that Dr. Johnson, who owned that he often 'talked for victory,'
rather urged plausible objections to Dr. Robertson's excellent
historical works, in the ardour of contest, than expressed his real and
decided opinion; for it is not easy to suppose, that he should so widely
differ from the rest of the literary world[700].

Thanks,
Luc "One Eyed One Horned Flying Purple Prose Eater" French