The Golden Rule for First Drafts

Never let AI write your sentences. Every word of your first draft must come from you, even if it’s messy, awkward, or ‘wrong.’ The roughness is where your voice lives. TURN OFF AI Assistants while writing your first draft, they will distract you into EDITING as you go, and this turns off the creative side of your brain. Be aware of the damage of editing too early.

Further guidelines for First Drafts

Absolutely Never Use AI To:

• Generate prose of any kind – not sentences, not paragraphs, not scenes
• Write dialogue – even placeholder dialogue
• Describe anything – characters, settings, emotions, actions
• Create your opening lines, transitions, or endings
• ‘Help’ when you’re stuck on how to phrase something (sit with the stuckness – that’s where you find your way of saying it).

Safe Research Uses:

• Verify historical facts: ‘What year did X happen?’ ‘What was the weather like in Cork in January 1923?’ Then check the facts independently!
• Check Irish language spelling and grammar
• Confirm place names, distances and geographical details
• Look up period-appropriate objects, clothing and technology
• Verify cultural or religious practices for accuracy

Safe Planning Uses (Before Writing):

• Generate lists you’ll select from: ‘List 20 occupations common in 1950s rural Ireland’ (then you choose which fits your character)
• Explore historical context: ‘What were common concerns for young mothers in 1980s Dublin?’ (for understanding, not for lifting phrases)
• Brainstorm possibilities: ‘What might cause conflict between two sisters in this situation?’ (read for ideas, never for language)

The Critical Distinction
Use AI to know things. Do not use AI to say things. Research is safe. Writing is not.

Exception: If you’re neurodivergent and struggle with getting thoughts onto the page, AI can serve as a transcription tool – you speak your ideas aloud, or dump them onto the page, AI captures them, then you edit heavily to ensure every word reflects your actual voice and how you would phrase it. This is using AI as assistive technology for access, not as a writer. The difference: you’re still doing all the thinking and creating; AI is just helping bridge the gap between mind and page. Please disclose if you have used this process.

Why This Matters

Irish writing has always had a particular texture – the rhythm of Irish English, the way dialogue sits on the page, the unexpected word choice that’s absolutely right. AI doesn’t have a feel for ‘I will yah’ (Cork). Or when to let a sentence run long or break short. It doesn’t know when Cork speech patterns should inflect the narration itself, or how silence works in Irish emotional exchanges.

First drafts are where you discover voice. That discovery only happens through your own struggle with language. 

Every time you let AI phrase something, you’ve stolen from yourself.

If You’re Tempted:

Ask yourself: Am I avoiding the hard work of finding my own words? The answer is almost always yes. Sit longer with the blank page. Your phrasing will come.

A first draft is where the messy magic lives. Please send the completed manuscript, but be aware that if we select it for publication, we will also want to see your first draft. Please save your work as Draft 1, Draft 2, etc.

AI Use during Editing

Disclosure

Please let us know if you have used AI for:

• Drafting or editing any part of your manuscript
• Creating case studies or examples that will appear in your book
• Translating content 
• Summarising your chapters, arguments, or research
• Writing or rewriting passages, scenes, paragraphs, or sentences
• Exploring creative directions that shape your thesis, narrative arc, or conclusions

AI Use that does not need disclosure

• Basic grammar or spell checking (use at final draft stage)
• Simple language polishing (use at final draft stage)
• Fixing punctuation (use at final draft stage)
• Naming support for chapter or section titles (use at final draft stage)
• Basic literature searches 
• Reference formatting
• Citation management 

Protecting Your Rights

You must not use any AI tool that restricts your rights, Mercier Press’s rights, or any third party’s rights to your work.

Before using any AI service, carefully review its terms and conditions, paying particular attention to sections on:

• Ownership
• Data reuse or data retention
• Training rights
• Opt-out provisions
• Content licensing

Ensure that:

• The AI provider gains no rights over your content beyond the immediate, limited right to process it for the specific service you’re requesting
• The AI provider cannot use your work to train its models
• You retain full ownership and all rights to your material
• No unintended rights transfers occur

Red flags: Any terms stating the provider can ‘use,’ ‘store,’ ‘learn from,’ or ‘improve our services with’ your content means they may be claiming training rights. When in doubt, do not use the tool, or contact Mercier Press for guidance.

If the tool is free please fully research and check if your content will be used for machine learning, usually, in this instance, the answer will be yes. Check the pro-versions to see if your content is protected.

We asked the AI:

What does ‘I will yah’ mean in Cork

Here is the answer:

“I will ya” (or “I will, ya”) in Cork is an emphatic agreement or affirmation – essentially means “Yes, absolutely” or “I certainly will.”

The “ya” softens it slightly or adds a conversational, friendly tone. It’s confirmation with a bit of Cork character to it.

You might hear:

• “Will you have another cup of tea?” “I will ya!”
• “Are you going to the match?” “I will ya, wouldn’t miss it.”

It’s more enthusiastic than a plain “I will” – there’s a sense of “of course I will” or “you bet I will” in it.

No! The actual meaning of ‘I will ya’ in Cork – means ‘I will not.’ But now that we have published this online, the AI probably knows this one now. But take it as an example of colloquial nuance and phrasing that reveals more than what is said.

Your writing is yours. For new and young writers, you will NEVER develop your style if you are using AI tools to flatten and borify your work. Yup, I made that word up – see, we can do that kind of thing.

AI – what does ‘borify’ mean?

I’m not familiar with “borify” as a standard English or Irish English word.

Could you give me the context where you encountered it? Was it:

• In a Cork/Munster conversation?
• In a manuscript you’re editing?
• Written or spoken?

It might be:

• A very local Cork/Munster term I’m not aware of
• A mishearing or misspelling of another word
• Slang or family-specific language

Where did you come across it?

I am not telling. I made it up, and now it’s mine. Used in the context of the sentence I used it in, I trust the reader will get it.

Now, on with the writing! Best of luck.

Dee

Just in case we haven’t made the damage AI will do to your creative work clear enough. We asked the AI itself how it would have destroyed Ulysses had Joyce used it for his writing and editing.

What AI Would Have Done to Ulysses at the Editing Stage

AI would have destroyed it. Specifically:

Stream of consciousness would be “corrected”:

• “Bronze by gold heard the hoofirons, steelyringing” → AI would break this into standard sentences with proper subjects and verbs
• Molly Bloom’s unpunctuated soliloquy → AI would add full stops, commas, paragraph breaks
• The fragmented, associative thinking → AI would impose logical transitions and clear topic sentences

Experimental structure would be “fixed”:

• Each episode’s distinct style (catechism, play script, newspaper headlines, medieval prose) → AI would flatten everything into consistent third-person narrative
• The Aeolus episode’s actual newspaper headlines interrupting the text → removed as “formatting errors”
• Deliberate tense shifts and perspective changes → standardise

Language play would be eliminated:

• Neologisms like “snotgreen” or “scrotumtightening” → replaced with standard descriptors
• Portmanteau words → separated into conventional vocabulary
• Multilingual puns and wordplay → lost entirely
• Irish English rhythms and syntax → converted to standard British English

“Errors” would be corrected:

• Run-on sentences → broken up for “readability”
• Incomplete sentences (everywhere) → completed
• Repetitions (deliberate motifs) → removed as redundant
• “Unclear” references → explained or cut

The result: A competent, clear novel about a man walking around Dublin. Doesn’t sound that exciting does it?! Everything that makes Ulysses revolutionary – the linguistic innovation, the formal experimentation, the way consciousness actually moves – would be optimised away.

AI editing optimises for immediate clarity and conventional grammar. Great work is built on rejecting exactly those standards. Joyce was trying to capture how humans actually think and experience time, which is messy, fragmented, associative and rule-breaking.

The lesson:
If you are doing something unusual with language, structure, or voice – if you’re breaking rules deliberately – AI will ‘fix’ it into oblivion. The more distinctive your work, the more damage AI editing will do.