Lamott, King, and Diaz Dialectical Journal

LAMOTT

 

“People tend to look at successful writers, writers who are getting their books published and maybe even doing well financially, and think that they sit down at their desks every morning feeling like a million dollars, feeling great about who they are and how much talent they have and what a great story they have to tell; that they take in a few deep breaths, push back their sleeves, roll their necks a few times to get all the cricks out, and dive in, typing fully formed passages as fast as a court reporter. But his is just the fantasy of the uninitiated” (301).

            This passage, I believe one of the most charming in the essay, reminds me of the Allen essay in which she wishes to debunk the myth of the inspired writer. It seems Lamott shares the same desire (and, as evidenced later, bears a grudge against those whom she believes actually are inspired writers). Both scholars agree that this fantasy is not the norm.

 

“The first draft is the child’s draft, where you let it all pour out and then let it romp all over the place, knowing that no one is going to see it and that you can shape it later” (302).

            Here Lamott gives us permission, and even encourages us, to write badly, to write anything, so long as we can get something on the page. You can’t revise until you have a “shitty first draft”.

 

“So I’d start writing without reigning myself in” (302).

            This is another important element of the “shitty first draft”. We must be child-like in our abandon while writing that first draft. We must take risks, explore every avenue of our subconscious, if we are going to come up with that hare-brained idea that we can shape into something wonderful later.

 

“What I’ve learned to do when I sit down to work on a shitty first draft is to quiet the voices in my head” (303).

            The last hurdle in getting the first draft on paper, Lamott says, is to quiet your inner demons. Don’t worry about what your inner critic is going to say about your writing, just write whatever pops into your head, critics be damned.

 

KING

 

“If that’s how things play out, then you are somewhere downstream on the timeline from me… but you’re quite likely in your own far-seeing place, the one where you go to receive telepathic messages” (305).

            King illustrates writing as telepathy by bringing to our attention that there exists a great deal of time and space between him and us.

 

“Decorative souls may add a little lace, and welcome—my tablecloth is your tablecloth, knock yourself out” (306).

            He reminds us that how he sees his writing is not necessarily the way we will see it. This reminds me of the McCloud article, what we see might not necessarily be what others see.

 

“It’s easy to become careless when making rough comparisons, but the alternative is a prissy attention to detail that takes all the fun out of writing” (306).

            King embraces the fact that his audience might see something slightly different than he does in his writing. He says that to impose your exact vision on the audience is to take away the magic of the telepathy.

 

“But it’s writing, damn it, not washing the car or putting on eyeliner. If you can take it seriously, we can do business” (307).  

            King demands the audience take the telepathic art of writing seriously, and I think the juxtaposition of the comic and the serious is brilliant. You have to believe in the magic for it to happen. When you come to the blank page, you have to commit to the fact that you have something to say, that you’re going to say it, and that others are going to read it.

 

DIAZ

 

“It was like I had somehow slipped into a No-Writing Twilight Zone and I couldn’t find an exit” (319).

            I like the colorful way Diaz describes his writer’s block. I am sure many students and professionals have felt this way at one time or another.

 

“Want to talk about stubborn? I kept at it for five straight years. Five damn years. Every day failing for five years? I’m a pretty stubborn, pretty hard-hearted character, but those five years of failing did a number on my psyche” (319).

            This sounds disturbingly similar to grad school.

 

“Five years of my life and the dream that I had of myself, all down the tubes because I couldn’t pull off something that other people seemed to pull off with relative ease: a novel” (320).

            Perhaps the source of some of Diaz’s despair is the notion of the inspired writer put forth by Allen. If he truly believes that others are succeeding where he is failing, that no true writer has experienced the difficulties he has with writing, then he might think that he is not cut out to write.

 

“I separated the 75 pages that were worthy from the mountain of loss, sat at my desk, and despite every part of me shrieking no no no no, I jumped back down the rabbit hole again. There were no sudden miracles” (320).

            What I think we can take from Diaz’s piece is that, when in doubt, work, work, work, work, and then work some more. Don’t expect an easy fix. Write because you have to, because you have something to say, because you are a writer, not because you think it should be easy.