An early story I wrote I edited again and again to make it better, but in the end I got the feeling the result was worse than before. Recently I tried to write short stories in one go and only check for spelling and grammar errors.
What is a good amount of editing? How should I know when to stop and simply publish the result?
It's easy to get that feeling, but it doesn't necessarily mean the story is worse (or that it's better). For this reason, I keep all my work under revision control (I prefer git, but there are others). That way, I can actually compare any revision that has ever existed to any other (to see if it's really worse or if I'm just tired of it), I can roll back to a previous revision (if a set of changes was actually a bad idea), and most of all see what is going on with my changes (to keep from going through cycle after cycle of editing over just a few phrases, which either means other parts of the work are being ignored, or I'm "done" and just didn't feel it).
There's no single answer for this. I recently was working on a short story that I was happy with in its first incarnation. I asked a former teacher to look over it, and he suggested a change in the style; I went with it for the sake of editing. After three days of hopelessly hacking at the story, I realized that all of the changes I made were making it worse, and what I really wanted all along was the first draft.
Moral is: don't be afraid to stick with your first draft if your edits aren't working for you.
Edit it until you're comfortable with the result. If you feel that your story needs to be edited more because something was left out, or you don't like the direction that the story is taking, or whatever the reason, then edit it. If you're happy with the story, then don't edit it. After all, it's your story!
