David Attenborough’s ‘Kingdom’ – 4 Crowns 1 King

Episode 1’s title, ‘Four Crowns, One King,’ is a gift for preachers, and Paul, the minister at Cheddar Baptist, pounced as any hungry predator would.

Amongst the various theological points, he pointed out that the studio floor was no doubt awash with unused, edited out, material. Five years of filming, submitted to the editorial team. The final version broadcast contains only the footage that fits the narrative; the rest was discarded, never to be seen.

A process, as writers, we know all too well.

Writing has its solitary side, but once the pen is down, a whole team of editors goes to work. Beta readers, Grammarly, structural and line editors, re-drafting…eventually something emerges that fits the narrative, the rest lies in the bin.

My apologies to Paul, but the rest of his sermon suffered from my editorial mind, which had drifted to an ‘Aha!’ moment. God is our editor.

If we have submitted our lives to Christ and if we are His workmanship, His letter, and His poem, we have submitted ourselves into the hands of the ultimate Editor, who is at work in us, shaping us to fit His narrative. 

To do that, He has to cut away and discard anything that qualifies as ‘dead works’ Heb 6v1. Back to the studio floor, strewn with excellent footage that we’ll never see. All excellent material. Hard work went into filming those clips; early morning vigils, focussing, self-editing…and yet, ultimately, discarded. None of it ‘bad’ or ‘poor quality’, or, to cross into metaphorical language, ‘sinful’. 

This is the painful process of editing, discarding good portions of our writing, maybe killing off a favourite character we’ve created and come to ‘know’ and enjoy. My apologies if you’re eating your cereal reading this, but circumcision comes to mind! Cutting away otherwise healthy tissue. 

So, whether it is God editing us – in life and as writers – or our editors going to work on our first, second, third drafts, it’s all with one purpose in mind: does it fit the narrative. 

I’m writing this on the 6.11 train from Yatton to Exeter St Davids. I have a meeting at 9 with an academic essay advisor and need to leave enough time for a decent coffee before facing the music. I’ve submitted my incomplete first draft of the first academic essay I’ve written – ever. 

Writing about creative writing seems vaguely humorous to me, but that’s the task set for this Master’s assessed unit called Writing Prose. The deadline is a few days after you will see this piece on MTW. 

So, it’s into the lion’s den for me. The advisor, as far as I can see, is the lion, the one king, and he’s hungry. I doubt if much of what I’ve written will survive but hopefully, the bits that fall to the studio floor will serve a higher purpose, and I can push on to write something that will fit the narrative.

For those that are interested, I’m writing about the Hero’s and the Heroine’s Journey as a template for writing fiction. The hero’s journey is well known. Not so, the heroine’s journey. I might write a MTW blog about the heroine’s journey in the New Year if I survive the 9am.

In the meantime, wishing everyone a Merry Christmas!