“When writing, you must kill your loved ones.” -William Faulkner
This core of wisdom imparted by an accomplished author is often misunderstood. This article will discuss how writers should correctly grasp this valuable concept and implement it in their work. Faulkner’s homicidal-sounding choice of words immediately catches the eye. It is obvious that he is telling the authors that they must kill the things they love, and the words chosen represent the heartbreaking feeling that the authors experience in performing such a task. Writing can seem harsh, and honestly, for writers it’s a very personal and often hard rule to follow. To correctly adopt the concept, it is important to open your eyes to the actual meaning that is intended. Whether the written work in question is a novel, an essay, a dissertation, an article, or even a letter, killing your loved ones ultimately benefits the readers. It is my hope to demystify this commonly misunderstood and misapplied concept of writing.
It may seem like this saying is specifically telling an author to kill off their beloved characters. This is often the meaning drawn, however, which is not entirely correct. Even popular horror fiction author Stephen King has reiterated this advice to writers with: “Kill your loved ones, kill your loved ones, even when it breaks your heart from your self-centered little hack, kill your loved ones.” . Although King’s characters often die, which is more typical of the horror genre than other genres, the point he’s making is not about the characters, but entire segments of writing in a play. Occasionally, there may be characters that will be removed from the story if without the beloved segment they end up being completely irrelevant; this would be a collateral damage situation where the author loses the character in the process of removing their loved ones.
Here’s one more quote that actually predates Faulkner’s by Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch, which I give here as a prelude to fully explaining the Kill Your Darlings concept: “When you feel the urge to perpetrate exceptionally fine writing, obey it – with all your heart, and delete it before you send your manuscripts to the printer. Murder your loved ones.” His advice cautions against getting so attached to a piece that it is submitted for publication in impulse based only on the writer’s high opinion of how good it is. This urge can be something that lasts not just for a few seconds, but for long periods of time. The idea is that there is an emotional connection that makes you feel fond of the author, but this does not translate for readers by default.
This is the lesson writers need to learn from “killing (or murdering) your loved ones.” The point is to eliminate, effectively kill, the things in your body of written work that don’t serve readers well. This could be an entire part of a story that has survived many revisions and editing passes. Something that is in the heart of the beloved writer, a true love, but it is completely unnecessary and disposable. It can be difficult for an author to take an objective look at writing that resulted from hard work on his part. It’s hard to accept that others see parts of the overall story as bad and not the precious element that the writer liked enough to finally decide to include. All parts of the whole must be examined, not on the basis of the personal attachment of the author, but by considering the impressions of an editor and/or an objective reader before publication.
Sometimes a writer can reach a more detached state where they can identify a beloved piece that exists only at their whim if they allow considerable time to elapse between writing and editing. This is a concept very similar to that applied in the visual arts. For example, many painters say they don’t reveal a work to the public, or perhaps even consider it finished until they’ve put it away for a few months and come back to it with no perceived new misgivings.
Exclude wanted items that:
- Obscure the theme or theme of the story.
- Independent and does not fulfill the purpose of the content
- Read as prose instead of a true story
- They are redundant beyond intended emphasis
Remember that this advice is not telling you to remove anything you like or enjoy about your work; if you did that, the result would be soulless and probably unpleasant to all who read it. Sometimes you can save darlings by making them more relevant to the goal of the story. Or if they seem to be part of a completely separate story, take them out of the current story and use them in a new one at a later time. Make sure all the elements come together and add value to the overall story. No one wants to feel like they just took a trip out of the story while reading the story, an infuriating experience that can turn readers away. It’s easy to fall in love with our own ideas and certain word phrasing, so as a final act before publishing it’s best to seek outside opinion. After all, in order to Kill Your Darlings they must first be identified.