Difference between submitted manuscript and final version

I'm glad you asked this. I scoured the internet for pre-published manuscripts quite a while ago but the closest I got was this: http://www.garthnix.com/writing.html

Just one notebook page of longhand writing and a typed page of Nix's pre-pubbed MS. It's not much, but it's all I found (I gave up in the end because the search wasn't productive enough to justify the amount of time I was spending xD)

*sits and waits for comments from people who had more luck*

Don't fret about it. Each one is unique. How different the book is from the submitted work depends on the author, the editor, and the manuscript.

Not online, but you certainly can get hold of annotated ms. My husband has Nineteen-Eighty-Four and the Waste Land. Also, I think a Dickens ms was recently digitised, but I don't have the linky, sorry.

Every Paris Review interview is accompanied by a facsimile of a manuscript page with editorial annotations and scrawl.

Sometimes the manuscript becomes almost unrecognizable, and sometimes it isn't changed at all, other than eliminating a typo or five.

Editors do not make changes just to make changes. The better the version you hand in, the fewer changes will be made.

The submitted manuscript is your idea of what the final version is.

The final manuscript is your agent/editor/publisher's idea of what the final version is.

Unfortunately, only the second counts.

n3onkn1ght said:

The submitted manuscript is your idea of what the final version is.

The final manuscript is your agent/editor/publisher's idea of what the final version is.

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The author does have the final say, though.

BethS said:

The author does have the final say, though.

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Yes and no. In some contracts it says author must agree to make changes, not all but some, or MS will not be published. A friend of mine did sign one that said author had to agree to all changes though. Not saying it was a good contract or even a good publisher, just saying

And an author can dispute changes, but usually it is for the better so why would you want to?

elindsen said:

Yes and no. In some contracts it says author must agree to make changes, not all but some, or MS will not be published. A friend of mine did sign one that said author had to agree to all changes though. Not saying it was a good contract or even a good publisher, just saying

And an author can dispute changes, but usually it is for the better so why would you want to?

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I think I was too vague.

What I meant was (and this applies to the US only; I've heard things sometimes work differently in other countries*), the author (whose name will be on the book, after all) has the final say over changes. But (as you pointed out) there may be consequences for refusing to make changes, up to and including canceling the contract.

In general, I think creative differences and compromises are worked out with the editor during the revision process. It's not as though the editor takes the book and rewrites it and the author has no say. That's all I meant to say.

* I know a German guy who writes military thrillers. He says that in Germany, editors make changes without consulting the author. On at least one occasion, they actually wrote and inserted a sex scene that he never saw until it was too late. No reputable publisher would ever do that in the US.

BethS said:

I know a German guy who writes military thrillers. He says that in Germany, editors make changes without consulting the author. On at least one occasion, they actually wrote and inserted a sex scene that he never saw until it was too late. No reputable publisher would ever do that in the US.

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Terry Pratchett actually changed his German publishers because, I kid you not, they put an advertisement for soup in the middle of his book.

n3onkn1ght said:

Terry Pratchett actually changed his German publishers because, I kid you not, they put an advertisement for soup in the middle of his book.

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Wow.

elindsen said:

And an author can dispute changes, but usually it is for the better so why would you want to?

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Sometimes changes are for the better, sometimes for the worse, and sometimes so horrendous it's unbelievable.

Writers have a lot more power in this than new writers seem to think. There are times when an editor will insist on a change, but usually only when some plot hole is so large you could drive a truck through it, or when the novel is twice as long as that publisher wants, but very, very few editors, good editors, ever order anything outside of such extremes.

Outside of the completely unrealistic plot hole, or ridiculous length, good editors make suggestions The writer can follow or not. Too many take these suggestions as orders.

It's the writers book, and if an editor shows strong interest in acquiring that book, it's because it's already pretty darned good, and he isn't going to force changes you don't want to make.

No editor can force you to make changes. It's your book.

And every now and then the changes are so horrible that you have to say no, even if it means walking away.

Check over on Joe Konrath's page. He used to have the outline for Bloody Mary available to take a look at for free. Also, there are lots of scripts available online. I particularly like to compare the original script to the final movie. William Gibson's script for Alien 3 is a very good example of a great script and, IMO, a poor movie (of course, they didn't use much of Gibson's s script, if any).