How to edit your own writing: a step-by-step self-editing checklist

TUREFF• •0

Editing your own work is hard because you know what you meant to say, so your brain fills in what is missing. The trick is to create distance, then work through the draft in stages, from the big picture down to the commas.

Step back first

Wherever possible, leave the draft alone before editing. A day is ideal for a longer piece; even an hour, or a walk, helps for an email or a short post. When you come back, you read more like a stranger and less like the author. Other ways to see the text afresh:

Change the font, size or colour, or view it on a different device.
Print it out and edit on paper.
Read it in a different place from where you wrote it.

Read it aloud

Reading aloud slows you down and makes you hear the rhythm. You will notice sentences that run on, words repeated close together, and phrases nobody would actually say. If you trip over a sentence, rewrite it. Some people use their computer's text-to-speech feature, which reads exactly what is on the page, not what you intended.

Edit in layers

Trying to fix structure and spelling in the same pass means doing both badly. Work from large to small.

Pass one: the structural edit

Ignore sentences and look at the whole.

Can you state the main point in a sentence, and is it clear early on?
Is everything in a logical order? Would moving a section help?
Is anything missing that a reader needs to understand you?
What can be cut? Remove paragraphs that repeat a point or wander off topic, even good ones.

A quick way to check structure is to write a one-line summary of each paragraph. If the summaries do not form a sensible outline, the piece needs reorganising.

Pass two: paragraphs and flow

Does each paragraph have one main idea, and does its first sentence signal it?
Do paragraphs connect, or does the reader have to jump?
Are your transitions doing real work ("because", "however", "as a result"), or just filling space?

Pass three: the line edit

Now go sentence by sentence.

Split sentences that carry two or three ideas.
Change needless passive constructions to active ones.
Replace vague words with specific ones.
Cut filler: "very", "really", "in order to", "it is important to note that".
Check that each pronoun clearly points to the right noun.
Vary sentence openings if several in a row begin the same way.

Pass four: proofreading

Proofreading is a separate job from editing. Go slowly, and look only for errors.

Read backwards, sentence by sentence, so you focus on words rather than meaning.
Check names, numbers, dates and links individually.
Look at headings and captions, where errors often hide.
Use a spellchecker, but do not trust it fully; it will not catch a correctly spelt wrong word.

Common errors checklist

Homophones: their/there/they're, its/it's, your/you're, affect/effect.
Apostrophes: plurals do not take one ("two cafés", not "two café's").
Subject-verb agreement, especially with long subjects: "The list of changes is attached."
Comma splices: two complete sentences joined only by a comma. Use a full stop, a semicolon or a conjunction.
Dangling modifiers: "Walking home, the rain started" suggests the rain was walking.
Inconsistency: switching between British and American spelling, or changing tense without reason.
Repeated words, especially from cutting and pasting.

Know your own habits

Everyone has tics. Some people overuse "just" or "actually"; others write very long sentences or start too many with "So". Keep a short personal list of your usual mistakes and search for them specifically with your editor's find function.

Know when to stop

Editing can go on forever. When your changes start to swap one acceptable word for another rather than fixing real problems, the piece is ready. For important work, a second reader is still worth having, because no checklist fully replaces fresh eyes. What is the mistake you always catch too late? Share your self-editing tips in the comments below.