"Kill Your Darlings": Cutting What You Love (When You Must)
- Déborah Braun
- Apr 16
- 1 min read
When you’re writing, there’s always that moment when a scene, a line of dialogue, or an idea feels brilliant, moving. And sometimes, it truly is. But that’s not the point. The real question is: does it belong to the story?
Because you always have to come back to the fundamentals: What are we telling? And how are we telling it?
“Kill your darlings” is a slightly brutal but essential reminder: we don’t write just to stack up beautiful scenes. We write to tell a story. And anything that doesn’t serve that story, even if it’s masterfully done, ends up weighing it down, or even blurring what we’re really trying to say.
That doesn’t mean writing coldly, without passion. But as much as possible, we need to avoid falling in love with our own work. Keep a bit of distance. Look at it with enough clarity to be able to cut what doesn’t serve the whole.
Even if it hurts. Especially if it hurts. (It always stings a little.)
Sometimes, what we cut is what made us feel the strongest. And paradoxically, that’s often the sign we’re on the right track: when we’re no longer writing for ourselves, but for the story. When we start to truly listen to it.
