How to Write Drafts of Awesomeness
Noah J. Belisle
Miss Dr. C
Brit. Lit.&Comp. Period 4
18 January 2016
How to Write Drafts of Awesomeness
Writing is a never ending process of revision and additions that slowly form a work into a masterpiece. There are many different writing styles and ways of revision, yet they all follow the same basic guide lines. There are two articles that have helped improve the way I write and revise my works, Anne Lamott's “Shitty First Drafts,” Paul Henry Robert's “How to say Nothing in 500 words,” and Ken Macrorie's “The Poisoned Fish.” These works have changed my perspective on how writing should be conducted.
Drafts are apart of everyone’s writing process and effect the quality of the final draft. Anne Lamott refers to the first draft being the most painful to put on paper “We all often feel like we are pulling teeth, even those writers whose prose ends up being the most natural and fluid.” (Lamott 1) I agree with Lomott's statement that the hardest part of any paper s getting the draft completed, and the best way that I figured out is to let the ideas flow freely onto the page and no mater how terrible it is the idea is on the paper to be revised at a later date. Every first draft is shitty, yet over time it is refined and reformed into a better and better work and to quote you Miss Dr. C “there is no such thing as a perfect paper only a due date.”
Another impact that Lamott's paper had on me was to forget procrastinating and the fear of someone reading the shitty first draft but instead to “Even after I'd been doing this for years, panic would set in. I'd try to write a lead, but instead I'd write a couple of dreadful sentences, XX them out, try again, XX everything out, and then feel despair and worry settle on my chest,” (Lamott 1) I am very much like Lomott where if I can't find the perfect words I tend to erase and try again and again till the frustration sets in and I walk away before I break something. After reading and rereading Lomott's paper I have given up on trying to find the perfect words every time and just let the words flow onto the paper without end until I reach a paint that I am comfortable with and go back over it checking if there is anything I want to change or add.
Much like Lamott's article Paul Henry Robert's work has changed my opinion on procrastination and how an argument is constructed. For a teacher, after spending hours of grading papers with the same argument over and over again its best to take something on the other side of the fence or something that stands out and isn’t the typical argument, “One rather simple way of getting into your paper is to take the side of the argument that most of the citizens will want to avoid.” (Robert 4) Robert's argument that the side less argued comes across far better than the road more traveled, if a solid argument can be constructed then go for it putting a new perspective on an argument. With any essays that are coming up later in the semester I will try and take the side less argued and put a new approach on my writing.
The repetition of the same topics over and over again is directly related to procrastination, and a lack of effort. Robert address this as one reason why students tend to score very low on essays “It comes to you that you do your best thinking in the morning, so you put away the typewriter and go to the movies. But the next morning you have to do your washing and some math problems, and in the afternoon you go to the game...What with one thing and another, it's ten o'clock Sunday night before you get out the typewriter again. You make a pot of coffee and start to fill out your views on college football.” (Roberts 1-2) Roberts provides perfect examples of procrastination that are very much like mine with the stupidest excuses in order to not have to do my work until its too late to keep putting it off and I just have to buckle down and bust out as much as possible. This also relates to Anne Lamott's argument about needing more than just a first draft to get the best point across because the first draft is always the worst and in need of the most work in order to have a well refined and steady flow of ideas to get the point across. Each day spent putting off work means that there is only more to the next day and the next until its too late to keep putting it off and many nights are spent without sleep till the work is done.
With procrastination comes the use of “Engfish,” which is the installment of words that just take up space. Ken Macrorie explains that is is more of how the teachers have been taught to grade versus the students and how they perceive writing “Most English teachers have been trained to correct students' writing, not to read it; so they put down those bloody correction marks in the margins. When the students see them, they think they mean the teacher doesn't care what students write, only how they punctuate and spell. So they give him Engfish.” (Macrorine 1) Macrorine states the truth even I have fallen victim to “Engfish,” because there have been times where I feel my work is never read and a grade is just assigned over a craps game or in eighth grade when I got a paper covered in red pen only pointing out the mistakes and problems and never showed any apparition to the content itself. I feel that a majority of teachers are guilty of this yet within my high school career and especially this year the work is being read and given popper feedback instead of being overlooked and forgotten.