This thesis examines Alexander Pope’s literary career through the lens of his own portrayals of revision and the composition process. I argue that Pope’s career-long interest in revision in its many forms — rewriting, rethinking, rewording, correcting, imitating, translating, editing, etc. — extends beyond the remit of manuscript interpretation and textual scholarship that it has predominantly been confined to, and merits thematic consideration as a unique and as yet underappreciated hallmark of his style as a poet. My more inclusive approach to defining revision aims to show how other forms of self-reflection, self-editing, or self-moderation that occur in media res in Pope’s oeuvre, aspects of his style that are generally treated separately from his compositional process, for instance as forms of scepticism, argumentative inconsistency, or ambivalence, do in fact work in synergy with and ought to be considered part and parcel of the more conventional kinds of editorial revisions Pope is better known for as a ‘reviser’. In the course of four chapter-long case studies I seek to construct a more holistic sense of what revision entailed for Pope by recognising the differing visibilities with which Pope himself revealed his own processes. I argue throughout this thesis that Pope’s own textual and paratextual references to composition are designed to have a persuasive effect. The first chapter considers Pope’s unusual use of the word ‘superfoetation’ to describe errors of composition in The Works of Shakespear. I illustrate how Pope’s interest in authorial decision-making could inform the ways in which we view creative processes in Pope’s own works, particularly The Rape of the Locke and The Dunciad. The second chapter explores the ways in which Pope’s portrayal of in-text self-correction in Eloisa to Abelard characterises Eloisa as both a heroine and a writer. I argue that Eloisa’s meandering movements of self-doubt ultimately betray the delight she takes in writing for writing’s sake. The third chapter shows how Pope’s use of revision in the Epistles to Several Persons enables him to address the epistemological barriers preventing him from fulfilling his opus magnum vision, without necessarily giving up on his original ambition altogether. In the fourth and final chapter, I investigate the role revision plays in building an enduring sense of hope and anticipation in An Essay on Man. This chapter concludes the thesis by showing that, beyond being an inevitable aspect of the composition process, revision can function as a persuasive device as well as a way of thinking and communicating in and of itself.