Producing a piece of text finished in ‘first draft’ form involves
both your private efforts to generate raw text and improve on
it, and seeking outside commentary and advice. The overall
process can be pictured as having four phases, moving from
most personal and private to most public. Going public with
your commitment, a text that crystallizes your thought and
for the moment fixes it in one configuration, is a particularly
sensitive stage that needs to be handled carefully.
In Phase 1 you write out a semblance of the argument to an
approximate length of the chapter you are embarked on. This
stage produces raw text, words on screen or handwriting on a
page, arguments played out or attempted, facts marshalled, con-
nections made, positions expounded – but maybe not yet in any
satisfactory joined-up form.
In Phase 2 you stockpile and reassess your text for a while,
looking for ways to upgrade it and tighten it up. After leaving a
short gap (because some time and distance are needed here), you
can review what you have, looking for omissions or inconsis-
tencies, trying to trace the development of the argument and to
see places where moving things around can improve things.
During this shape-up stage it can also be useful to show bits of
text to friendly readers, that is people close to you, such as
fellow PhD students, friends, relatives, significant others or
lovers. Even people without a background in your topic can be
helpful foils, sympathetic readers who can look at your text dis-
passionately and tell you how accessible or well written it
seems. A trusted, intelligent but inexpert listener can also help
you test your key arguments by letting you say them aloud and
more accessibly. If you are very lucky and get on really well
with one or more of your supervisors, perhaps you may get
them involved in this shaping-up stage. Phase 2 may involve
you in making multiple small revisions as you go along. But it
normally ends with you making a first systematic run through
of your work, inserting additional materials, tying down loose
referencing, moving and reknitting text in an improved
pattern, and consolidating lots of small upgrade changes into
a revised form.
In Phase 3 you begin to go public with your text, accumulate
comments, and incorporate them in a more fundamental
revision or remodelling. In professional contexts you can only
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