There's Nothing Wrong With That

I touched on a topic on Wednesday that I feel I should explain further. My daily writing, as I said, doesn't always have to be good, and this is one of the things that very much helps me to keep doing it. But this raises the question, I suppose, on whether or not that's a good thing. Does writing then become something I do to maintain a schedule or a habit? Is that the only benefit I gain from those days where no ideas come?

The reason why many people often don't like putting out sub-par work is probably related to the belief that writing without substance isn't truly practice. Certainly in the past I, too, have held this view. Something should be done right or it shouldn't be done at all. How can you practice if you don't practice doing something well? Why bother writing if you cannot show it to someone else? Why would you ever work on something that won't come to anything?

But the thing is that, as a writer, any writing I do helps. Every time I put my thoughts down in words, I am honing this ability in a certain way. Certainly, not all work is equal or produces the same effect. Writing a novel helps you in a different way from drafting an essay, and both of those produce a much different effect from everyday journaling.

But the point is that every type of writing that you do is helpful. Writing frequently in a number of styles allows you to experiment in order to find what works and what doesn't. The book Composition in Four Keys contains an essay by James Moffett called “I, You, and It”. In this essay, Moffett discusses the differences in various types of writing, as well as how ideas evolve alongside considerations for audience and the amount of thought and reflection that has gone into them. The argument continues by stating that if he were to teach a writing course, it would cover all sorts of different genre work before ever approaching argumentative essays. He probably says this far more eloquently than I could:

Many teachers may feel that such a program slights exposition in favor of so-called personal or creative writing. In the first place, one doesn't learn exposition just by writing it all the time. An enormous amount of other learning must take place before one can write worthwhile essays of ideas; that is in the nature of the whole abstraction process. All writing teaches exposition.(Moffett 27)

This is an important thing to keep in mind because it is something that so many people will judge you for. A lot of literary study seems all wrapped up in itself, arguments about the literary canon, this belief that there is a set collection of works that should be deemed literature and that nothing else contains any value. I have heard of creative writing professors who will severely downgrade students who write anything that is not strictly realistic fiction. I may be only a student, but as a writer, I have to say this is nonsense. The only thing you will learn by just reading the literary canon is how to be narrow minded and unoriginal. The only thing you will learn never challenging your writing style is how to get stuck in a self-recursive rut.

I myself feel inadequate a lot about the things I read. If you look at my summer reading list, there are some classics, but there are also a lot of young adult, fantasy, and humor books in there too. When I got back to school, I was discussing books with a classmate only to find out that the reading he did included Vonnegut, Cormac McCarthy, and a number of other things that were intensely cerebral and highly regarded. I honestly felt embarrassed, and I changed the subject.

But the thing is, I shouldn't have felt that way. There is a time and a place for everything you will read, from modern masters to literary classics to groundbreaking science fiction to erotic fanfiction to bad novelizations of blockbusters. Everything you read can influence you or inspire you in some way. My challenge to you this year, for every book you read for either fun or for classes, is to find something that really stuck out to you either as a good idea for later use or a bad idea to be avoided. Approach everything you read and write with the knowledge that it's a good decision.