Here is a reflection I did in response to our first Studio Journal assignment, as well as the chapter it was based on. Studio Journal Entry One - October 3, 2019 For this studio activity, I shared a chapter from Anne Lamott’s book Bird by Bird, called “Shitty First Drafts.” I absolutely love this chapter. I first read this piece in my high school sophomore English class, and have studied it several times since in other writing classes. Lamott writes in a voice that does not come across ‘high-and-mighty,’ but casual, relatable. The presence of her voice is strong within the chapter, my favorite quote being: “Not one of them writes elegant first drafts. All right, one of them does, but we do not like her very much. We do not think that she has a rich inner life, or that God likes her, or can even stand her. (Although when I mentioned this to my priest friend, Tom, he said you can safely assume you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do)” (Lamott 22). There are several other segments I appreciate, both in association to our course material, and personally as writing advice, as I will explain. Primarily, I chose to share this segment in the hopes that my classmates would experience like I did the delightful, informative journey that is reading this chapter. “Shitty First Drafts” is the sort of read where you can walk away after both feeling that you’ve learned something, and with a smile on your face. I saw connections between a couple of the ideas from this chapter and our study of expressivist theory. This quote exemplifies the first instance: “The first draft is the child’s draft, where you let it all pour out and then romp all over the place, knowing that no one is going to see it and that you can shape it later” (22-23). This demonstrates the expressivist idea that the best writing requires spontaneity, the act of putting pen to page and seeing what comes out of it. People write to discover. As Lamott writes, “There may be something in the very last line of the very last paragraph on page six that you just love, that is so beautiful or wild that you now know what you’re supposed to be writing about…” (23). Expressivism proclaims that writers discover their meaning (and self-actualization) through writing, which to me is demonstrated here. The other expressivist idea I saw in the passage is towards the end. Lamott describes all the voices constantly in her head while writing, and her process to quiet them down (imagine them each as mice, trapped one by one in a soundproof jar). This description ties in to the expressivist view of society’s influence on writing as an act of liberation against society’s corrupting influence. In blocking out these imaginary voices, Lamott mimics the practice of individualising, looking inward, and distancing herself from society’s sway. During our discussion, my classmates too saw the expressionist view of spontaneity and non-conformity within this chapter, and agreed it was an excellent example of both. My classmates each shared different but equally applicable artifacts. Kaitlin shared a New York Times lesson plan called “Picturing the Past,” in which secondary students were instructed to bring photographs of their families into class to help spark inspiration for their writing. I felt that this exemplified the expressivist ideal of self-reflection, as students were inspired by their own previous experiences. Our group also discussed how this connected to the expressivist idea presented in Britton et al’s “Shaping at the Point of Utterance” of how speech should be a model for expressivist writing due to its spontaneity. Students discussed the photographs they brought in before writing about them, encouraging this spontaneity. Kylie shared a second artifact: an erasure writing prompt, where students took pages from old books and blacked out words to create new compositions. Our group felt this showed the expressionist ideas of discovery within writing. We did question whether drawing on a previously written text material would be objectionable to expressivists due to its connection to the larger society that expressivism scorns. We concluded, however, that the personal experience that a writer must draw on to generate original and ‘good’ writing by expressivist standards extends to experience with previously written texts such as the ones used in the prompt. Moving forward, I do not think I would make any significant revisions to the artifact I presented. Writing advice of the sort offered in this chapter is so subjective that it’s hard to suggest revisions, except perhaps on the grounds of objection to the views the writer has to offer. In this case, I agree strongly with the points that Lamott presents. Since first encountering this article, I have used her advice both in drafting my own writing, and in my everyday life (her mouse visualization can be an excellent meditation to help with falling asleep). Lamott’s chapter not only contains strategies I find quite useful in the practice and teaching of writing, it also contains reassurances of the worthwhile nature of attempting to write. I would be delighted to present it to students in a classroom one day.
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