Blog 3 or The Art of Writing Without Writing

Mr. Graves, on page 116, states, "Our primary concern is reacting to someone else . . . rather than finding our own way." I have always felt this to be a problem in academia and even in my own house. I recall my mother saying the best way to survive in school is to find out what your teacher wants and then do everything to accomplish that. I heard that in HS and college. Twenty years ago when I first attended, I rebelled against that nonsense to the point were I eventually dropped out. Now that I have returned, I am still rebelling against that advice but now I know why. I do follow all the guidelines set in a syllabus, but I always write in my voice. This is what I did not understand before, my voice. I always knew I wrote a certain way and regardless whether the writing was a research paper or a creative piece, my voice came through. And most of the time it was accepted. If I attempted to change the way I wrote it felt very uncomfortable as if someone else was in my body trying to write. Blehh.

Mr. Graves also writes, ". . . the writer must find his own subject" (115). Obviously this is different than voice, but interrelated. If I or any student is not engaged in the subject matter of the piece we will find it difficult to write in our voice. Mr. Graves also mentions that the experience of discovery is emotional not intellectual (115). The "Aha" moment as it is described in a different text I am reading, though Mr. Suhor in his essay uses "Yeah!" That is a good feeling. When you find a subject that allows the piece to almost write itself.

Lesley Rex writes about students opening "themselves to the affect and effect literature has on them . . . to lay hold, to impress, and to change them . . ." (119) Frankly there was a lot of good ideas in all these essays, I do not need to write a three page blog and bore everyone. On page 121 middle sentence begins with "The dramatic impact and persuasive engagement . . ." Page 124, "write about significant experiences," p. 125, "that no secret formula . . . exists for writing effectively"

Murray, p. 329, "we are commanded to be outgoing. But writing is ingoing." And the rest of that paragraph. Writing is definitely solitary, even if you are in the middle of an classroom. Suhor talks about silence being necessary to the writer and these two essays piggyback nicely upon one another. Murray, "withdraw without shame and confront ourselves."

Suhor writes of transcendence, silence and overanalyzing. Using the silence to reflect on the work, how we wish to proceed, to brainstorm, meditate on the subject, (engage in) the joyful experience of literature.

The theme these authors seem to be expressing is that writing is individualistic, and needs to be for the writer to be most engaged. We all know this now as adult students but how many of us were taught differently and still find ourselves slipping back. Is this truly the way students are now being taught? Or are we still pushing the boulder up the hill against entrenched curriculum? I am curious, I have been out of school for a long time, many things have changed, many have not.