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“Kill your darlings” was an expression Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch came up with, to tell young writers not to fall in love with a particularly fine passage. He wrote,
If you here require a practical rule of me, I will present you with this: ‘Whenever you feel an impulse to perpetrate a piece of exceptionally fine writing, obey it—whole-heartedly—and delete it before sending your manuscript to press. Murder your darlings.’
It doesn’t mean “Kill all your characters”. Or even, “Don’t treat your characters with compassion and love.” Even when bad things happen to them, as they will.
“Kill your darlings” was an expression Sir Arthur Quiller-Couch came up with, to tell young writers not to fall in love with a particularly fine passage. He wrote,
If you here require a practical rule of me, I will present you with this: ‘Whenever you feel an impulse to perpetrate a piece of exceptionally fine writing, obey it—whole-heartedly—and delete it before sending your manuscript to press. Murder your darlings.’
It doesn’t mean “Kill all your characters”. Or even, “Don’t treat your characters with compassion and love.” Even when bad things happen to them, as they will.
