writing

Stop whatever else you are doing. Close your email application and Facebook, turn off the background music, silence your cell phone. Put it all away. Do it now. I’ll wait.

Sit in silence, without distraction, and read this post. Silence the part of you that makes false claims about the utility of background music or the necessity of leaving your cell phone turned on. Silence the part of you that wants to argue with me, right now, about my unreasonableness, the part of you that makes claims for this or that distraction. Still the monkey mind that never shuts up, never stops talking, never ceases inventing new ways to jostle, cajole, argue. Stop arguing and listen: the voice of a writer can only be found within silence.

Silence.

Start with that. Stay within it. Allow it to grow around you, to blossom, to disclose the images and words that inhabit the landscape of your inner life. Don’t control it, or direct the flow of that nascent energy. Sit, and read, and watch yourself.

Forget that you are trying to write. This fact is irrelevant to the creative process. It is a curiosity. A writer finds and follows the creative voice. The means by which this happens, the structure in which it unfolds, the particulars of the path: these are secondary and inconsequential. A writer follows the path, whenever it appears and wherever it leads.

A writer does not invent or create the writing. Instead, the act of authentic writing leads the writer. Accordingly, the task of the writer is to find — within — the stream, thread, and path of creative energy. Writing inhabits its own life, is its own animal, is a being struggling to be free of the cages we build around it. Don’t take my word for it. Find the cage, find the animal.

Listen.

Stop arguing. Your arguments, like mine, only serve to strengthen the cage. The animal of the creative is not swayed by our smartness, our wit, our experiences. It does not care how many books we have read or how many fancy words we know. It is not interested in our expertise and the many ways in which we layer our insecurities one over the other.

The animal of the creative wanders the landscape of gods and heroes. The animal has seen things we no longer remember. The animal is what we once were but have chosen to cage as a means of protecting ourselves from the vastness of what we cannot grasp, the depths into which we no longer dare to gaze.

The creative animal is primordial, eternal, wise beyond our knowing. It has been waiting for us, all this time. Listen to what it has to say.

Write.

Allow the creative animal to write for you one good word, or sentence, or paragraph. Don’t mess up the writing. It is difficult to say what this means, this messing up. Perhaps you are cool, or smart, or erudite. Forget all that crap. It is meaningless. Write honestly. Let the creative animal speak through you.

If, as you write, you start to worry about what people might think of your writing, you may as well not start. Give it up now, before you waste any more time. Or tell the part of you that wants to be a rabbit rather than a wolf to shut the hell up.

Write something. Don’t worry about what genre it is. Genres have no meaning. Writing — all writing — is, at heart, an extended negotiation with the creative animal. That animal is partly you, yes; but is also not you, is wholly an emissary of that mystery we run from and slide toward.

And the animal is — for the most part — silent. Do not forget this. Words are not the creative, cannot be the creative, will never be the creative. They are echoes. Treat them as such. Find the source of those echoes.

Find the cage. Find the animal.

Into Thin Air by John Krakauer
Thing that must not be Forgotten by Michael Kwan
Running in the Family by Michael Ondaatjie.

The Creative Process is a Mythological Journey

In which first there is:

The Call…

a beginning, an initiating force (or event) behind all creative and personal development. The Call is an unexpected event, a trauma, an intrusion into the sedate and comfortable lives we craft so carefully. In creative work, the Call is the moment of vision. In turn, it is a stage requiring of us a disruption in routines, an openness, an encouragement of the mystery. In myths and stories, the Call takes the symbol of the unexpected letter, or the sudden injury, or the surprising twist away from the ordinary. The Call is the gateway, and is followed in turn by:

Refusal of the Call…

in which we assert for business as usual, for the way things were, for the re-establishment of our ordinary world. The task of the artist (and the writer) is to refuse to refuse. We must slow down, and listen, and open the eye of seeing. Universally, the opening of that eye is assisted by:

The stranger…

who we meet on the road: the wise one, the elder, the mentor. The stranger offers compassionate assistance, evokes our openness and our patience. Without the stranger, neither the work of creativity nor of healing is possible. With assistance from the stranger (who is an archetype, and may therefore also be a trusted friend), we cross the threshold, take a deep breath, and enter our own wilderness. Clarity is required here, and intent, and a willingness to open the gate. Wind lies on the other side, and the unknown. Our path lies that way, toward:

The labyrinth…

in which we become confused and disoriented. We seek but do not find shelter. We become lost, and fall into ourselves. Trusting the process is the task here: dealing with the dark, the cliff, the shadow. Discomfort, fear, and inertia become companions. We hear the monster which haunts all labyrinths, and which is our own inner life projected outward. But the labyrinth has one path only: toward a confrontation with the monster. We must keep going. All tales confirm this. And if we do keep going — simply, with trust, with purpose — we:

Face the monster…

and find the beast to be our own wisdom in disguise. The monster is a teacher, a guide, an enemy who becomes an ally. From the monster we learn:

 Clarity…

and we move onward to discover the still point at the center of the labyrinth. Healing and spirituality and creativity reside at this center. Peace is made with the past there. We gather up the scattered threads of our inner knowing. We recognize the illumination to be found at the centre, and in so doing we begin to shape the tale of our journey. Above all other junctures in creative work, the still center is of the core and essence. It is here that all parts of ourselves align, and for a moment we glimpse ourselves all the way down into the Soul. When the still point arrives, creative work is almost done; healing is almost done. But first we must make our way back into the world, by way of:

The shallows…

and the bridge, which will deliver us back to the world we departed so long ago. That land now seems foreign, and strange, and we find ourselves uncertain about how to find our place within it. Creativity, after all, is a journey of the inner life, and is only peripherally about what we craft. Creativity is the personal path inward, toward our own discoveries. The shallows and the bridge are ways forward, and outward, to:

 Return…

to the world, to the bright day of sharing our discoveries with the community. And yet, because the inner journey is so rich, and intense, and powerful, often we:

Refuse to return…

and instead we become addicts of the creative process. We want to move to a mountain hut, we wish to leave the world by way of the imagination. Creative work becomes its own hurdle on the path. We dream of becoming the eternal traveler on that wondrous path. But, as the old stories tell, there appears again:

The stranger…

who calls us back (and who need not be the same stranger); the one who invites and demands that we share our work with the world — so that they too might see, and know, and be healed. They set watch fires for us, and they wait, and we embark upon a mysterious journey back. We cross:

The return threshold…

and enter the world again. We bear gifts of wisdom and of healing. We have been burned by the light of illumination and are healed. We share our gifts with the community; and in this celebration there is a pausing, a:

Conscious integration…

of what we have undertaken and learned, a recognition of wholeness and completion and healing. We become the stranger for others. We have crossed the wide sea and know its ways. We rest, for a moment. And in this space of quiet, while we are not paying attention:

The cycle begins again.

Here are two parables. The first is from Tibetan Buddhism, the second from the Brothers Grimm. Read each of them. Finish the stories they tell. Make your narratives as long or as short as you like. Post your results in the forum.

Parable of the Warrior Princess (Adapted from Tibetan Buddhism)

A young warrior princess completed her training under a renowned teacher and was accorded the title Princess of Five Weapons. Armed appropriately, and embodying her forty-two virtues, she set out on the road leading to the eternal city.

The road led the princess west, across the wide desert and into a forest. At twilight she reached the first trees, where she found other travelers who warned her to turn back. They spoke in fearful tones about an ogre, an eater of hearts, who lurked along the most shadowed paths, killing all those who happened by. But the princess was confident of her training. Fearless, she pressed on.

At a dark place, where branches overhung a stagnant stream, the ogre emerged from the underbrush. It was a phantom, a wraith, a brute with crushing hands. The princess deployed her five weapons, but the ogre was strong (and crafty) — one by one, the weapons of the princess were defeated. But she did not relent. After each weapon was spent and lay broken on the ground, the princess resumed the battle, challenging the ogre again and again.

Finally, the ogre paused, and asked her, “Youth, why are you not afraid?”
“Ogre,” replied the princess. “Why should I be afraid? For in life, death is absolutely certain. What’s more,”…

The Golden Key (Last Tale of the Brothers Grimm)

Once in the wintertime when the snow was very deep, a poor boy had to go out and fetch wood on a sled. After he had gathered it together and loaded it, he did not want to go straight home, because he was so frozen, but instead decided to make a fire and warm himself a little first. So he scraped the snow away, and while he was clearing the ground he found a small golden key. Now he believed that where there was a key, there must also be a lock, so he dug in the ground and found a little iron chest. “If only the key fits!” he thought. “Certainly there are valuable things in the chest.” He looked, but there was no keyhole. Finally he found one, but so small that it could scarcely be seen. He tried the key, and fortunately it fitted. Then he turned the lock once, the lid popped open, and in the chest the boy saw…

A personal essay is a non-fiction creative writing essay in which the author utilizes the perspective of personal experience to articulate larger themes (in traditional literary criticism, such themes were once termed “universal”). A personal essay focuses on the perceptions and feelings of the author and uses these to reflect upon subjects such as nature, politics, history, culture, and literature. The personal essay derives its impact from the integration of individual and universal considerations. This integration allows the reader to explore the unity of human experience.

A few exceptional personal essays have been sufficiently powerful as to change the literary and cultural landscape. For example, Jacob Bronowski’s series of personal essays based on his visit to the ruins of Nagasaki and Hiroshima in 1945 (essays such as The Face of Violence and The Abacus and the Rose) helped initiate the now long-standing debate about the place and limits of science. Similarly, Wendell Berry’s An Entrance to the Woods was instrumental in articulating the philosophy of the current environmental movement. And, within the last couple of years, William Langewiesche’s personal essays about his experiences in Iraq have significantly shaped views of the Iraq war.

As creative non-fiction, personal essays blend together the composition techniques of various genres including narrative fiction, journalism, natural history, and historiography. Multiple points of view may be used, as well as ruminative passages, personal vignettes and philosophical reflections. This flexibility gives personal essays a tremendous range, and is one reason they have been a favorite mode of expression for many writers.

As in every genre, some examples are foundational. Below are a few personal essays that have earned wide circulation. You may recognize some of these authors from their longer works. The first two of the essays listed below are in your reader; the last two are posted in this week’s reading section.

E..B. White, Once More to the Lake

Wendell Berry, An Entrance to the Woods

Stanton Michaels, How to Write a Personal Essay

William Langewiesche, Hotel Baghdad: Fear and Lodging in Iraq

Let’s take these essays one at a time, starting with Once More to the Lake. E.B. White lived and wrote during a time in which people still thought of literature as a classical art with specific forms. His writing sounds more formal than much of what we read today. And yet, “No one can write a sentence like White,” as James Thurber once said. Indeed, E.B. White is the “White” of the much-beloved style guide called The Elements of Style. More than any other single compositional text, The Elements of Style is responsible for the tone and style of much twentieth century writing.

The Elements of Style lists eight elementary rules and ten elementary principles of good writing. I’ve reproduced this list below.

Elementary rules of usage

• Form the possessive singular of nouns with ’s.
• In a series of three or more terms with a single conjunction, use a comma after each term except the last.
• Enclose parenthetic expressions between commas.
• Place a comma before ‘and’ or ‘but’ introducing an independent clause.
• Do not join independent clauses by a comma.
• Do not break sentences in two.
• A participial phrase at the beginning of a sentence must refer to the grammatical subject.
• Divide words at line-ends, in accordance with their formation and pronunciation.

Elementary principles of composition

• Make the paragraph the unit of composition: one paragraph to each topic.
• As a rule, begin each paragraph with a topic sentence; end it in conformity with the beginning.
• Use the active voice.
• Put statements in positive form.
• Omit needless words.
• Avoid a succession of loose sentences.
• Express co-ordinate ideas in similar form.
• Keep related words together.
• In summaries, keep to one tense.
• Place the emphatic words of a sentence at the end.

The guide also offers various tips and suggestions regarding style. (Here are most of them, sourced, along with the lists above, from Wikipedia: 1. Place yourself in the background. 2. Write in a way that comes naturally. 3. Work from a suitable design. 4. Write with nouns and verbs. 5. Revise and rewrite. 6. Do not overwrite. 7. Do not overstate. 8. Avoid the use of qualifiers. 9. Do not affect a breezy manner. 10. Use orthodox spelling. 11. Do not explain too much. 12. Do not construct awkward adverbs. 13. Make sure the reader knows who is speaking. 14. Avoid fancy words. 15. Do not use dialect unless your ear is good. 16. Be clear. 17. Do not inject opinion. 18. Use figures of speech sparingly. 19. Do not take shortcuts at the cost of clarity. 20. Avoid foreign languages. 21. Prefer the standard to the offbeat.)

Beginning writers typically struggle most with the “omit needless words” guideline as well as the suggestions not to “explain too much” and to “be clear.” But as you read Once More to the Lake, notice that White is a consummate walker of his talk. You may easily find examples of his adherence to all of the above principles and practices. But can you also find where he has strayed from those guidelines?

What do you think is going on with White’s attitude toward technology in the essay? Read carefully when you get to the passage about the outboard motor. Does White seem to be anti-technological here, or is he simply trying to work out the place of technology? Remember, he’s writing during the 1950’s, a time when many people thought that global nuclear war was inevitable.

Is this an essay about aging? About nostalgia? About childhood? About family? Or is it all of those things strung together? And if they are strung together, how—precisely—does White accomplish this?

Spend some time on the passage near the end, when the son puts on the wet swim trunks. Literary folks have been talking about this passage for years. There’s something compelling about it. What do you think is going on? What are we supposed to take from this passage, and from the essay in general?

In another essay called Here is New York, published a few years before Once More to the Lake, White spoke about the vulnerability of New York in the nuclear age:

The city, for the first time in its long history, is destructible. A single flight of planes no bigger than a wedge of geese can quickly end this island fantasy, burn the towers, crumble the bridges, turn the underground passages into lethal chambers, cremate the millions. The intimation of mortality is part of New York in the sound of the jets overhead, in the black headlines of the latest edition.

This passage was widely quoted after September 11. Its enduring quality makes the case that well-written prose can persist, beyond the lifetime of its author, beyond the norms and currents of a given historical period. We will see this same type of enduring quality in the work of Wendell Berry.

But before jumping into Wendell Berry, let me ask you a question: do you know who Wallace Stegner was? If you have heard of him, I will be impressed with your literary knowledge. But most Canadians would draw a blank on the name. Which is unfortunate, because Stegner has been a strong influence on current Canadian writers such as Sharon Butala. He grew up in Saskatchewan (where today there is Stegner House, a creative writing centre). But Stegner lived much of his live in the United States (where he founded the Creative Writing program at Stanford University), and this is likely the main reason he is not more familiar to Canadians. Much of Stegner’s writing might broadly be called ecological, or environmental, and the strain of environmental writing that we now see coming out of central Canada owes much to him.

Wendell Berry was a student of Wallace Stegner’s, at Stanford—as were Ken Kesey, Sandra Day O’Connor, and Larry McMurtry. (McMurtry wrote the screenplay for Brokeback Mountain.) And like the other luminaries of that program, Berry has had a long and well-respected career. He is, in many ways, the defining archetype of the phrase “a sense of place.” In An Entrance to the Woods, we can see the strong environmental ethic in his work, the sense of earthiness and embodiment. It’s as though Berry takes the struggle of E.B. White—how to balance nature with human ambition?—and shows another path, an integrative path where we can once again find our connection to the natural world.

While you read An Entrance to the Woods, try to focus on the rhythm of the piece: the slowing down of Berry’s thoughts and impressions, the way in which he asks us to slow down with him, the careful way in which he structures the beginning of the essay so that we follow him into the woods—which are a metaphor for what? Or are they a metaphor at all? What do “the woods” mean?

And later, as we’re reaching the centre of the piece, what’s going on with those inscriptions that Berry finds? What’s he trying to tell us?

Again, as with E.B. White’s essay, we need to ask ourselves what exactly Berry is doing to create the mood and the momentum of his narrative. Is he using some (or all) of the principles in The Elements of Style, or is he developing his own methods? And how similar are Berry’s methods to those of other contemporary writers?

As a review, and as a diversion to refresh your attention, take a moment now to scoot over to A List Apart’s Writing Guide and compare their guidelines to what you are seeing in An Entrance to the Woods. Notice that Dennis Mahoney’s guide advocates a specific relationship to the so-called rules of writing:

The best rules can’t be stated, but you can learn them by reading excellent writing. Develop an ear. If you know what works, you’ll start to emulate it. Conversely, it’s good to study truly horrendous language, stuff that makes you embarrassed for those responsible. You’ll find yourself mortally afraid of—and automatically avoiding—the same mistakes in your own writing. Hemingway said, “The most essential gift for a good writer is a built–in shock–proof shit-detector.” (They’re cheap if you haven’t already got one.) This is especially important for web writers, most of whom are publishing without the benefit of editors.

Pay attention to that last sentence about publishing without an editor. That’s you, right? And sometimes me, and often anyone who wants to place words on a page (or a screen). Read well. Develop an ear. Find what works, and why. Stop using adverbs (my favorite tip). And, just for good measure, pay attention to the various brief writing guides that come out now and then on the web. Here’s a good one.

Back to Berry. An Entrance to the Woods is an essay about stewardship (among other things), which is the essence of Berry’s writing. And this stewardship has a long reach: into politics, culture, economics, and government policy. Recently, at a commencement speech at Lindsey Wilson College, Berry said:

The line that connects the bombing of civilian populations to the mountain removed by strip mining … to the tortured prisoner seems to run pretty straight. We’re living, it seems, in the culmination of a long warfare—warfare against human beings, other creatures and the Earth itself.

So: how is it that Berry is able to make statements such as those above—which are direct and highly charged politically—and to write about nature with such gentleness? And, if you read An Entrance to the Woods carefully, how is it that Berry is able to imply statements such as the one above but without coming right out with them? How has he hidden the directness of his message so skilfully?

Think about it. It’s an important question.

Next we move on to Stanton Michaels’ How to Write a Personal Essay (Intro. Three main points. Summary. Sex). This essay is the only work by Stanton Michaels of which I am aware. He is not a well-known writer, has not won any awards, is not schmoozing with literati at Pulitzer galas. He has written one great piece. It was originally published in The Georgia Review, in which Wendell Berry has published numerous pieces.

Let’s start with the beginning:

The easiest way to write a personal essay is to use the standard form taught in Composition 101: an introductory paragraph followed by three paragraphs outlining three main points and a final summary paragraph. But instead of just blathering about yourself, describe vivid scenes and what they mean to you, such as when your 2-year-old son, Jordan, solemnly declares from the bathtub “I can’t swim—my penis is hard” and you tell him it’s OK, it’s normal, knowing it’ll subside and he’ll be able to swim soon, but you don’t tell him that teeny little weenie he’s holding will be the source of the most intense worries, sorrows, and pleasures he’ll ever experience, and you wonder if you’ll ever be able to tell him the truth. You could follow this thought with the trials and tribulations of your own penis, unless you’re a woman—but of course females are involved with love, sex, and life built around their own body parts, which can provide many interesting topics. The key to maintaining reader interest is to be open and honest, displaying your concerns and fears through specific, true-life examples rather than abstract concepts about how you think sex education is important because you learned the hard way on your own and you doubt you’ll explain things any better than your own father did. Follow this format and, while you may not become a world-renowned author, you will be able to complete a personal essay.

How many compositional rules did Michaels just break? I count at least six. And what’s with the interminable sentences? And the loose language? And the meandering narrative? But wait—take a few minutes now and read it all the way through…

And you discover, despite your reservations, that this is one fine piece of writing: personal, evocative, expressive. And it’s five paragraphs, as promised, comprising precisely 2500 words (go ahead and count ‘em; I did).

What makes this work? After all, it does break most of the rules. But ask yourself: how could Michaels have articulated any better the joy and pain of the phases of his life that he describes? It works, I suggest, because the entire essay is in Michael’s own distincitve voice, which is quirky and eccentric and disarmingly honest. It’s as though he’s not simply writing but inviting us to witness the inner workings of his mind and heart. How to Write a Personal Essay starts out with humour and thereby disarms us, so that later, when the more difficult and intense material comes, we are not quite ready for it, we are still open and undefended. The material goes right in.

It’s often said that an artist first must learn to use the rules and then learn to break them. It seems an accurate statement with regard to Stanton Michaels. What I’d like for you to take from this piece, to remember after reading it, is that the rules are always subservient to the writer’s own authentic voice. And that voice, as Joseph Conrad said, “cannot be silenced.”

Speaking of Joseph Conrad, who is a great source of inspiring literary ditties: he once stated his artistic aim as follows:

By the power of the written word to make you hear, to make you feel… before all, to make you see. That—and no more, and it is everything. If I succeed, you shall find there according to your deserts: encouragement, consolation, fear, charm—all you demand—and, perhaps, also that glimpse of truth for which you have forgotten to ask.

Finally, let’s consider William Langewiesche’s Hotel Baghdad: Fear and Lodging in Iraq. Langewiesche is considered to to be a pioneer of the so-called new new journalism, which is another way of saying creative non-fiction. Langewiesche is the son of a pilot and writer who composed a fine book of personal essays, entitled Rudder and Stick, that would be very much at home on our list of outstanding works. In Hotel Baghdad, Langewiesche describes his experience of trying to survive the Iraq war. Notice his stark prose style, the way in which he utilizes both personal and impersonal perspectives, the manner of his interdisciplinary discussion of various related topics. In many ways, Langewiesche is a writer of tremendous rigour, in the spirit of E.B. White. His writing is spare and formal, though utterly engaging.

What do you think he is trying to say when he talks about sweeping bullet casings from the balcony? And, in his discussion of the Green Zone, how does he articulate (or hide) his own political views?

Choose a paragraph—any paragraph—and notice how Langewiesche adheres strongly to the principle omit needless words. And yet, Langewiesche’s essays on the rebuilding of the World Trade Center (later published in book form as American Ground) were the longest articles ever published by The Atlantic Monthly, perhaps the finest literary magazine in the United States. Tight prose facilitates, rather than precludes, thorough expression.

Finally, consider the three essays as a whole. Which is your favorite? Why? What is the one scene or vignette that resonates with you the most? What technique does the author use to create that resonant mood? And how can you create that mood yourself?