The Artist's Way

Boice’s methodology does seem a bit prescribed. It reminded me of this new-agey book a friend of mine gave me called The Artist’s Way, which regiments a habit of "morning pages," among other rather conventional exercises like "Draw a picture of someone who discouraged you in the past as a monster." Here’s a link if anyone is curious: http://www.amazon.com/The-Artists-Way-Julia-Cameron/dp/1585421472/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1346291547&sr=8-1&keywords=the+artist+way). 

Still, I appreciate the article’s sentiment. It’s easy for outsiders to view writers as antisocial tortured recluses, fevered and obsessed when they’re prolific, miserable and bitter when they’re not. It’s further alienating when a common perception is that writing is not “real” work, and that you can only be a prolific writer amidst the coming and going of some mysterious muse. This might be a view that some of our students have about writers: “good writing” is inaccessible because the culture of writers seems inaccessible. Tell them they’re all writers, and you might as well be telling them they’re all pipe-smoking English professors.

As writers at the graduate level, we’ve probably learned by now that it’s beneficial for us to “commiserate” among one another, sharing our “private fears and frustrations” (5) in regard to our writing processes. We may know that many of us face the same problems, and that the process for each of us is very involved and very distinctly different. However, encouraging these kinds of discussions among students—who may be new to or off-put by a college level English course—is important, and it really should be pivotal in any composition class. Students need to know that writing is a dialogue, not a competition. This is why I make sure to have students discuss their work aloud at each stage in the paper-writing process. I’ve gotten good feedback for this element of my classes; students say it’s encouraging “hearing what everyone else is doing.” How did their peers select and narrow down their topics? How did they do their research and organize their drafts? Solidarity in the classroom also cuts down on the likelihood of procrastination. The procrastinator is less “endearing” (12), as Boice described, when he or she is unable to contribute to a class discussion about process.

On a more personal note, like Kavita said, I saw elements of myself in Boice’s “Categories of Explanations for Failings” (7). I too have been unable to fall asleep after binging; I let my face tense up while working; my extremities will fall asleep; it’s hard to pull away once I perceive I’m “on a roll.” In response to the article, I automatically started doing “comfort checks” while reading—ten minutes, stand up and stretch, un-tense tongue. I don’t know if it made the process “pleasant,” but it did keep my back muscles from aching. From now on, I'll try to be more aware of my body while writing.

Motivation?

The type of motivation (and the subsequent suggestions for strengthening this motivation) that is discussed in the chapter is not, I believe, the kind of motivation with which my typical student struggles.  The exercises, advice, and anecdotes that Boice draws upon all revolved around individuals who already consider themselves “writers,” of a variety of types, and who have clearly set goals to accomplish with their writing (write a draft of a novel, meet a deadline for an article, etc).  Therefore, Boice’s task was not necessarily to motivate them “about” writing or the importance/reason(s) for writing, but to motivate them “to” write, to do the actual legwork involved in the writing process.  I feel that my students need much more encouragement and assistance with the former type of motivation, and that motivation of the second kind can only really come after the first has been established.  This is why I have really enjoyed working with my classes on the first assignment, it (hopefully) establishes this first level of motivation so that we can then move on to the kind discussed by Boice i.e. motivation to actually write.

I believe that the following YouTube video encapsulates this concept, with kittens substituted for students: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vdQj2ohqCBk.  The kitten inside the box represents a student who has not yet come to see the importance or significance of writing i.e. why she should get out of the box; she does not have the proper motivation.  It is this kind of motivation that we must instill in our students initially, before we can motivate them to take up the actual writing process i.e. the work the kitten must do to get out of the box.

Recollections of a Skeptic

I understand we are supposed to share something that would apply to our students or could be used in our classes that we teach, but all through the reading, I just couldn’t help relating the article to myself (I will surely be coming to this later). I found the article to be an easy, helpful (to an extent) but a cloying read. I discovered a couple of things in the article that I found to be something I could share with my students, to help aid their writing process.  The first thing that I am a strong advocate of is “free writing,” (28) and the notion of  “Recollective Rewriting” that Boise encourages sounds very fascinating. I had a discussion in class this week about what it is the students like or dislike about writing. The following things resonated with what I read in the article:

I had students say that they had a lot of anxieties about formatting and drafting a ‘grammatically sound” paper, and this sabotaged their motivation when it came to writing. I was explaining to them that free writing might be a way to get around it, and “the method of writing whatever comes to mind without stopping to edit (Boise 28),” will help them not let the insecurities about style or grammar get in the way of their thought processing.  

The other thing that seemed to stump many of the students was the difficulty in starting where they left off the day before. Here I think the “recollective rewriting” cue can help out by reinstating the continuity in their train of thought. My classes have a paper that’s going to be due soon, and I am hoping to share these ideas with the students to see if they help them. I do free writing assignments in class as part of the process in writing the paper, and I think “recollective rewriting” is something they can do at home when they continue to work on the projects that we start in class but do not have the time to complete.

Okay, so this was about the students; however, one of the things that I really (and I  mean, really) liked was the “tongue check” exercise. I did not even know that I did that (press my tongue at the roof of my mouth) even when I am reading. I am definitely going to be looking out for that one!

Also, like Anne, I too highly value hypomania. I will comment on that in reply to Anne’s post. I have a lot of my writer friends who vouch for the “brief daily sessions,” but being a hypomaniac (yes, I know it is not a real word), I can’t wrap my head around the bds’. I am definitely going to give it another try (sometime in my lifetime…).

And one last thing, I found Boise to come off a little bit showoff-ish. He seemed a bit prophetic and almost god-like in his judgments about the “poor, unsuspecting writers” suffering from writer’s block.

I can definitely agree with Steve's comments about relating this article more to myself than to my students.  But his comments also made me wonder about what my students would have to say about all this Boicean advice.  So I asked them in conferences today.  They were quite honest about their writing practices and how they felt about writing in general.

I have a really awesome group of students who come from a variety of different writing backgrounds; some say they love writing while others claim to hate it, some told me they had excellent writing teachers in high school and others told me they felt their high school English/writing courses were a colossal waste of time.  Almost all of them gave me a weird look when I asked about their writing processes.

Again and again I received similar answers about feeling nervous about starting a paper and putting it off.  This seems to support Boice's comments about writers' fear of failure.  The common consensus seemed to be, the more nervous they were about a paper, the longer it took them to actually start working on it.  Just to hear this line of reasoning, it doesn't make much sense.  But I also remember feeling/acting the same way with papers when I was an undergrad (slash possibly as a grad student, with certain confusing/frightening professors).

My conferences today were presented to my students as casual, get-to-know-one-another type meetings. I told them they didn't need to have anything prepared for our meetings, but that it might be helpful if they started thinking about their first papers (the first drafts of which are due on Wednesday).  No one came to me with any semblance of a draft.  A few brought up some half-hearted ideas of what they might write on.  Almost every single one left with a [new] idea and notes on something they were [or at least appeared to be] excited to write about.  Those moments in each meeting when the student would dig in his or her bag for paper and a pen to start jotting down notes.....well, I'm going to start gloating so I'll cut myself off.  But those moments were awesome.

Basically....I think my frustration with Boice's piece is that he seems to be positing some kind of scientific, will-work-for-everyone process of writing.  And I'm not sure such a magical process exists.  But I do think that writing becomes much less frightening when we move away from the "recalcitrant child" model and into the arenas of our interests (5).  I find it hilarious when students say things like, "I really hate writing, but I actually enjoyed this project..."  I just tell them, "you don't hate writing.  You've never been invested in your writing before."  And I think that's where the true motivation comes through.  Not through garden walks or hypnosis (those maybe that works for some writers), but through the simple desire to put your thoughts and opinions into writing.

Hurry Up, We're Dreaming

I am your classic writing-procrastinator. I even procrastinated writing this blog, which, among the many high-pressure, intellectual, career-affecting writing a graduate student feels she must produce is pretty low on the “drudgery” scale. Yet as the title of Boice’s book recognizes, writing truly is “A Psychological Adventure.” For me, this means that writing has progressively become harder as I grow older and more “educated” (example: I’m re-reading the sentence I just wrote and seriously doubting whether it is grammatically correct or not; you’re re-reading this sentence and deciding it’s not). Thus Boice’s chapter on “Motivation” seems not only the perfect place to begin How Writers Journey to Comfort and Fluency but also a perfect way for me personally to begin afresh in this new PhD program.

Boice begins his piece with an epigraph that describes Jane Austen’s (think a poorer-man’s Downton Abbey) writing environment – the idyllic late-eighteenth century English countryside of the landed gentry. Quickly rushing over this epigraph in my reading, I did not even realize it was about Jane Austen until Boice states, “When we write with both calm and confidence at hand, we work in an ideal state of motivation, one marked by patience and enthusiasm much like Jane Austen’s” (2). At this point, I noted that “reading” could be interchanged for “writing” in this and many other places throughout this first chapter.  The word that comes to mind is “ruminate.” I thought about this concept as Boice goes on to describe why motivation thrives on “calm and confidence.” “First,” begins Boice, “positive motivations originate in self-assured emotions. Doubt is no friend of motivation. Second, emotion in writing functions best at Moderate levels. We do our best problem solving in a state of mild happiness”(1).  If “doubt” is no friend to motivation, then how am I, as a very self-doubting graduate student, ever supposed to discover the motivation to write in a calm, scheduled, and confident way? I also felt as if Boice was not speaking directly to the place I am as a writer or the expectations that are placed upon me as a graduate student in English. Unlike the writers in Boice’s workshops, I have never felt “guilt” after a late-night writing marathon or weekend-long writing bender. This is perhaps because Boice’s primary audience in this piece seems to be adults writing as a profession, particularly adults who write creatively as a profession. While I as an (aspiring) literary critic may hope that Virgil’s Muse graces me with her presence as I summarize the scholarly conversations I am entering and as I craft (sometimes) nuanced positions of my own, I have certainly never expected it.

Focusing on audience also helps clarify some of the myths that Boice wants to dispel: “The belief that good writing must be spontaneous” (2) or that “most writers write only because they have unhealthy motives and personalities” (10). If there’s anything that graduate school convinces you of, it is that good writing is never best when it is spontaneous. And while I’m sure all of us have read a scholarly article or two that seems to have come from a pretty dark place in an academic’s life, I do not assume that “unhealthy motives”  inspire my colleagues.  So, in my reading, I was compelled to examine my own perceptions of some of my favorite contemporary American authors (who I do assume engage in unhealthy behavior and some pretty manic-depressive writing practices at times), and Boice’s answers to the “forcing” that I’m sure every writer (no matter the genre or purpose) has felt at times.

As Boice discusses, “Most of us know the familiar, somewhat diabolical scenario of forcing: We wait until the last minute and then we write at breakneck speed, defying our internal editors…to keep pace with our frantic outpourings” (3). The result is physically, mentally, and emotionally taxing, which anyone who has written a seminar paper in twenty-four (or even forty-eight) hours can tell you (not that I have done it, I am just saying).  The result of such writing is that it is “hurried, under-revised and under-edited” (4). Ideas are not allowed to take full form, sentences are verbose and sloppy, and the vocabulary we use is often imprecise.  While forcing is different from other obstacles writers face, such as the notion that they must “wait” for inspiration, the two work hand-in-hand. Thus, when Boice states that he wants to “salvage some parts of waiting and forcing” (14), my attention is immediately piqued. His answer to the conundrum is “moderation,” a beautiful word for those of us with obsessive-compulsive tendencies. “We conclude the discussion by recognizing the possibility that ideal motivation comes with compromises between forcing and passive waiting. That is, we recall the famous writers who employ a modicum of forcing moderated by habit (‘they just do it because they are used to doing it’) and of waiting enhanced by preparing (‘by the time they start, they are already doing it’)” (18). Boice’s encouragement toward moderation, which involves “regular work in daily sessions, regardless of mood”(15), and is expressed in his Rule #4, “Practice a regular habit of writing to instill reliable motivation” (31), reminds me of advice that one of my professors gave our graduate seminar a few years ago. He told us that if we started treating our graduate education as a “real-world” job now, we would be in the habit of reading, writing, and engaging our field’s conversations before we even dreamed of applying for an academic position. He compared this habit to spiritual disciplines or habits, not in order to argue that academia should become a religion, but rather that the process of consciously forming our identities as individuals in society requires meditation, repetition, and ultimately, dedication.

For me, this is the same idea I am attempting to instill in my students when I write syllabus sequences for assignments that stretch out the writing process to a series of calculated steps that require a habit of writing.  Somehow I have also found this idea comforting when thinking about the overwhelming amount of reading one must complete for each graduate seminar in any given week. If I am in the habit of reading for 6-7 hours a day (and oh, how easily can I slip out of this habit?), then it will be more manageable to imagine having to read for 10 or 12 during crunch times or in preparation for writing articles or exams. What is helpful about Boice is that his focus on writing in particular helps me begin to imagine how I can set writing goals for myself during any given period of time as well (what he would call “brief, daily sessions”). Why delay beginning those big papers I have due in November until Halloween? As Boice and the participants in his workshops realize, these resolutions are easier said than done. This is why Boice turns to Donald Murray’s advice to “wait.” The word alone reminds me of a song titled “Wait” on the band M83’s 2011 album Hurry Up, We’re Dreaming (referenced in the title of this post). “Wait” is track no. 5 out of eleven, an interesting position for a song that both lyrically and sonically implores the listener to wait. The lyrics, while simple, still remind me of the desperate urgency I feel sometimes when faced with writing deadlines as the chorus repeats “no time, no time, no time” (you can watch an unofficial video here:  http://vimeo.com/28418196). The song’s position on the album also reminds me of Boice and Murray. Just when a writer feels the overwhelming urge to tensely type away on an ill-conceived argument, these process-focused practitioners encourage us to “reframe,” to literally take a breath and pause. This is all part of a long process of what I would think of as prewriting – the bulk of the work that goes into a “final” piece of writing. As Boice states, “We agree that above all we need to practice patience and a willingness to try things” (23). My writing will continue to happen in frantic writing-binges after bouts of guilt-ridden procrastination unless I can learn to practice patience (to wait!) while ALSO developing a habit of writing. There is something paradoxical about such advice, which makes me wonder if Boice will continue to elaborate on the steps in this writing journey throughout the rest of his book.

Okay...

I found it amusing/discomfiting that, instead of thinking of my comp students (whose names I have yet to learn), I kept thinking, "Oh, yeah, I should probably stop doing that," or, "Oh, yeah, I should probably start doing that," or, "Oh, yeah, I should probably think about if I want to do or not do that, or if I want to stop or start doing that." While I have a history of successful binge-writing, I understand that the importance of discipline.

This is something that I've always tried to convey to students, the idea that when they write, it should be a process that spans days rather than late-night hours. Many students binge-write, I believe, because they don't enjoy the process. Rather than prolong it, they'd rather get it over with in one fell swoop, suffer five-six hours of excruciating pain, steal codeine pills from their narcoleptic roommate, rather than spend a week deposing a paper. It may even give them an excuse for a poor grade later: "Yeah, well, I wrote that the night before, professor-man."

So the task, then, is how to recover/instill the pleasure of writing. From what Boice says, a lot of this has to do with adjusting their writing process, the way they approach their writing. Somehow the dread  and fear of failure must be removed. In past classes I've required students to turn in parts of the process--theses, outlines, drafts-- in order to anticipate and avoid last minute writing, to varying success.

Also, reading this chapter and the excerpts from student responses, it felt like Boice was teaching older writing students. Is there a unique challenge in teaching 18 year-olds?

Response to Boice Essay (and brief comments on Drew and Anne's responses)

 There are a few parts of the Boice essay that I found useful and also applicable I think to teaching english composition. When he describes how waiting to write can lead to not being able to find the motivation to do it. “When we wait too often for magic, we make ourselves vulnerable to disappointment and, in turn, hopelessness” (9). I do believe this message transcends to composition courses. Students (obviously) like to wait until the the deadline to do the writing assignments, then find out when it's too late that there are aspects they don't understand, or that they still don't have a clue what to write about. The message in all this, I think, is the important of getting into a daily habit of writing, or regularly thinking about the ideas you want to express and working to develop them, whether they pertain to creative writing or argumentative writing or anything else.

I also found it helpful when Boice talks about the idea of treating writing as participating in a conversation. That is something I'll try and think about throughout the semester as I prepare students to write their own essays. Maybe if they can enter into the mindset that they're “writing for public consumption” it will help them get more interested in doing it.

I think if you build into your syllabus scheduled preparation for the major writing assignments it will help alleviate some of the hypomania students could possibly face. Getting them to slowly progress into developing their thoughts so that when the deadlines come they're not experiencing the bingeing writing experiences Boice talks about. This also teaches them the points of time management that come later on in the article. Breaking up a paper into mini chunks (thinking about ideas, coming up with a thesis, writing a first paragraph, peer review paragraph to help further develop the idea, writing rough draft, etc.) gives them the ability to focus on a single task each time, culminating into the final draft of a paper. Breaking these chunks up into as Boice refers to them as “brief, daily sessions” or bds, will also reinforce the concept that writing is a process and not something that's done in a single frenzied moment of divine inspiration.

In looking at the other blog posts, I do agree with Anne when she talks about hypomania. She's right, a lot of creative writers do often work that way. I do think though the problem with beginning writers (perfect example: those in composition) think that hypomania is the first, last, and only part of writing anything. The truth of the matter is that writing is a process. Maybe the first couple of drafts will be written in a hypomaniac (maniacal?) form, but eventually there will be revisions, and there will be edits, and because of these things the concepts of bps and stopping apply.

I also thought Anne's activity was an interesting idea. She made the connection with finding the inspiration to write through physical activity which is something I've heard talked about from other writers—Joyce Carol Oates, for example, talks about the relationship between boxing and running in her book On Boxing, and there's also the memoir What I Talk About When I Talk About Running by Haruki Murakami.

I find it funny (humorous?) that both Anne, Drew and I focused on the binge/hypomania parts of the article. Maybe it's because that's sort of the glamourous image of the writer—writing genius prose or poetry in a drunken, gin-infused binge (or vodka or whiskey or whatever). It's certainly what we think of when we picture writers like Keroauac or Faulkner. Faulkner in an essay talks about how a writer should be “demon-driven” which further perpetuates the idea. The truth of the matter is, whatever binges Faulkner had, like almost all writers he revised. A lot. Again, this brings me back to the earlier points of how writing, no matter what it is, is a process.

What Actors could Teach Writers

Upon reading the first image (Jane Austen strolling carelessly through the garden as a means of relaxing herself before writing) I immediately knew this would be a interesting perspective on the writing process. Boice did not disappoint. While some of his points are hard to swallow, on the whole I admire his dedication to helping writers learn how to cultivate a enjoyable and relaxed writing experience. As someone who often fantasizes about sitting down to write at a relaxed pace but rarely does so, I appreciate any advice on how to better control my writing habits so that this ideal can become a reality.

One of the most difficult sections to agree with to me was the abandonment of writing "binges." I often look forward to a writing rush where everything in my mind seems to transfer effortlessly to the page. Of course, often looking back, the product of such rushes is never very polished and often borders on the edge of incomprehensible. Still, I still believe that such rushes have a place. When I wrote my master's these there was really just a couple of weeks that generated the majority of my content, and although it was unrefined, I still felt an immediate sense of ease that most of my thoughts were out there - even if they were not all grammatically correct. I believe that the most time consuming part of the writing process comes after the "writing rush," where the writing is left to gather up what has been written and synthesize it into something elegant and (hopefully) profound. Is this writing process valid or one to be replicated? Boice certainly would not think so, but I am not so sure.

Looking at Boice's suggested process, I agreed with much of what he said, even if many aspects of it seemed a little obvious (though vitally important). For example, I always have my students practice Boice's first step, waiting, whether they like it or not. It seemed that the majority of Boice's article was targeted towards writers that have not been exposed to basic college composition materials. He presented free-writing as if it were a completely new idea. Same with "understanding the conversation before entering it." These are basic composition theories that I teach every year in freshman composition.

The next idea of making sure a writer is relaxed and comfortable while writing seems to be obvious but it rarely practiced. As a theater major, I know that before we tried to accomplish anything substantial, be it rehearse a scene, practice lines, or perform a dance, we would take serious amounts of time relaxing ourselves. I agree with Boice that this same attention seen in many other artistic disciplines should also be directly applied to writing. It is amusing that there is so much resistance to these seemingly self-explanatory ideas in any other discipline. Anytime where the mind and body are being used to perform a creative act, from a dance to a piece of writing, it is only logical that it should be relaxed. It would be preposterous to walk up to a actor doing relaxation exercise before an emotionally tense scene and reprimand him or her for compromising the artistic integrity of the scene, but this is exactly what writers do when they complain that they must be emotionally or physically compromised in order to write "artistically." Another good point that Boice raises is a matter of longevity. If a writer must be uncomfortable and emotionally drained in order to write well, how on Earth can he or she be expected to repeat the activity over and over until retirement? Actors recognize that they must do the same play over and over, night after night for months or years at a time, and if they have to compromise themselves in order to perform it "well," then the the acting would be both dangerous and impractical. What relaxation does is allow the artist, be they actor or writer, to perform his or her art while maintaining emotional and physical health. Overall I completely agree with Boice that relaxation's part in the writing process is both wildly underestimated and over-criticized.

The irony of course is even as I write this, I recognize that the very act of "blogging" is one that encourages "binge" type writing in a often single, marathon session. Perhaps that is why Dr. Strickland asked us to perform this act in chunks... Either way, it is time to stop my "writing rush" and edit my work to see if any of what I said makes sense. Here's hoping!