Introduction: Proofread for Substack

@October 11, 2024 8:25 AM (EST) – @October 11, 2024 10:03 AM (EST)

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• Workshop chapter title: “Fuck writing rules”
• Can we talk about your beef with Rick Rubin? Have you read The Creative Act? I haven’t. Is it a scattered book of advice? The subtitle suggests it’s a unified theory: “A Way of Being.”

By calling this a “language,” instead of a “list of rules,” hopefully you see how it flips the vibe from constriction to expansion.

• The previous version of this was better. This is nominalization, and "flips the vibe" seems one level too colloquial for your book.
• "... hopefully you see how this is expansive rather than restrictive."

The essay fuses the soul of the memoirist, the rigor of an academic, and the pen of a poet.

• I love this sentence.

it became clear that not only were the same elements at play across very different essays but also that each element had a unique geometry.

• "Not only" always needs "but also.”

• Beware overly long subject-phrases. They get confusing, are hard to follow, and are passive.

The idea that a craft is made up of primitive shapes is at the heart of architecture.

• The entire highlighted part is the subject, where the verb is is.

Edit: “At the heart of architecture is the idea that buildings are made up of primitive shapes.”

• Subject: [bolded phrase]
• Verb: is
• Object: “the idea… shapes.”

• I suggest using “shape” throughout, instead of “geometry.”