The lotus 2

The writer John leCarre has said that he rewrites the first page of his books several times. Other writers probably do the same.
In the published book, only the final version of the first page is printed. If we did study the creative process it would be interesting to have a book consisting of all the versions and alterations of the first page - it would be a book of its own, maybe 100 pages all about the same page with small or big alterations. A theme with variation!
The traditional way, to throw away all bad versions and just publish the final one, is however quite justified. Trial and error is a method we have to use in order to find the best.
We could ask: which is most true, the first try or the final version. The first is probably most true towards the spontaneous mind set, but the final version should be most true to intentions and also to the language used by the readers.