[Posts to read]:
- Tomato Recipe
- A Brew Half-Poured
- The One with the Video on It
[NOW COMPARTMENTALIZED FOR EASIER GRADING! BONUS TL;DR VERSION AT BOTTOM!]
I’ve always had a thing for
minimalism. Whether it was in the form of wabi-sabi, sumi-e, or Islamic
calligraphy, I always liked how minimalist designs showed less but proved more
than any other art style: with just a few clean brushstrokes or a modest use of
space, a minimalist can capture the raw essence of his subject and let it speak
for itself unencumbered. It abhorred the tangled patterns of Persian rugs or
the dizzying filigrees of monarchal crowns whose every minute and gaudy detail
seemed like a pathetic cry for importance. Minimalism was different; it was
fresh, purposeful, and sincere.
Unfortunately, the same can’t be
said about my writing. Ever since the
beginning of junior year, I’ve always had this nagging suspicion that my
writing was stagnating, that there was weakness in my papers’ structure that I
couldn’t exactly pinpoint. I don’t remember precisely when this suspicion
began, but I do remember when it was confirmed. It was when Crooks had handed
me back my first DBQ and criticized my complicatedly florid style: “Good points
but awkward writing,” he scribbled next to a B.
At first, I figured that maybe it
was a fluke, that it was only the first essay of the year, and that I just
needed some time to get my mojo back on. But as the year progressed and AP Lang
gave me more of my writing to look at, I realized that holy cow, the guy was
right (in retrospect, it was Crooks
for crying out loud). And it wasn’t just him that confirmed my suspicions;
Keerthana did too. “It’s effusive,” she chirped after reviewing my bio research
paper.
Effusive.
That’s what it was. Now, she didn’t mean it as a bad thing, I’m
sure; on the contrary, she was probably patting me on the back for a job well
done (though if you asked her, it’d be my head).
[Growth as a writer.]
Nonetheless, she was dead on. My
papers were all gushing with
over-the-top enthusiasm. Here and there were cloying metaphors and blurred
allusions and cutesy word play that were more distracting than clever (I’m
looking at you, blog post titles). It finally dawned on me that the reason my
writing looked good but didn’t really sound good was because of all the purple
prose. (Case in point: You remember my off intro about childhood and global
warming in that one synthesis essay? Yeah – I grimaced reading that too.) In my
mind, I had just been cramming my papers with gimmicky rhetorical devices as if
each one was another point on the rubric or a pat on the back. Really though it
was more like calling my weed-infested jungle of a lawn a garden just because
dandelions are flowers by definition.
I think that’s my biggest
revelation this year, in terms of writing. It’s time that I stop trying to act
so clever, indulging in my own words, and finally just write again. I need to
be like a minimalist and learn how to mean more without saying more.
[Plans for progression.]
With that in mind, I think that I
definitely need to pick up more books. If I plan to overhaul my writing and
breathe some new life into it, I’m going to need to learn from the masters. I
don’t have a lot of familiarity with authors, so I was really glad to have been
introduced to Hemingway this year.
Now, to be honest here, I never
really got to finish The Old Man in the
Sea (alas a single grain of the sandman’s sand has more punch than a whole
sea of the lit gods’ red ink), but the “iceberg theory” really fascinated me.
At its core, it was practically like minimalism, shedding the unnecessary and
overt to transcend into a thought-provoking piece. I don’t even know how to
describe my awe and respect for someone who’s so keen to the world that he
knows which elements to sketch and elicit mountains of meaning. I definitely
have to go read more of start reading this guy’s stuff to see whether or
not I need to buy some frames and candles, dedicate a corner of my room, and
prepare my argument with my future wife about why our kid just has to be named
Ernest – even if our kid was a girl (“No, honey – Ernesta’s not the same as
Ernest!”).
Another incentive for me to read
though would be to be more cultured. Yeah, I know reading books will help make
in-class writings easier because I’ll have a library of references and examples
to support my arguments. But I’ve always known that and have never cared enough
to go read. What makes this year though different is Caroline. Seeing her
familiarity with all these great forms of text and the enrichment she absorbs
from them has really inspired me to do something similar. I think that with
more books under my belt, I’d see more from the world too from simple allusions
to trends and rationales behind real relationships between people. This greater
insight would not only add invaluable depth and realism to my writing, but it’d
also improve my reactions to the world.
What I ultimately want to find
from reading though is my voice. Besides not having an exemplar to act as a
filter, I think what’s also exacerbating my writing is this confusion I have
about what point I’m trying to make and how I want to achieve it. Reviewing my
blog posts, I see a lot of disclaimers and inconsistencies with tone: I’ll
speak personally and seriously for one moment before abruptly swerving away
with sarcasm and humor as if I wanted to erase whatever sentiment I was previously
propping; I sound like I’m rambling by dismissing the last words that I say. In
a wider scope, I think that it’s generally an extension of the confusion most
of us at the threshold of adulthood have. It’s partially because of the whole
“what’s your niche in this universe” question that I haven’t found the
purposefulness and confidence in my skills that are necessary for minimalism or
the iceberg theory.
In terms of writing, I do have a
vague idea of what I want. Cheesy as it may sound, I want the voice of a
friend. When I write, I want to sound
like somebody you’re having a real and open conversation with; I want to make
my point with just frank, casual language peppered only for the sake of eloquence
and not grandiloquence. I want to sound like somebody who doesn’t have to vomit
anything and everything just so you’d understand because you’d already know
from the few words I’ve said or the nuances of my face. Ultimately, I want a
style that’s lyrical in its simplicity but profound in its sincerity.
[Assignment evaluation.]
In searching for that je
ne sais quoi in my writing, I think the blog assignment was a great help. This
project really helped us explore our writing styles and realize not only what
we’re capable of but also how much we’ve grown as writers. Unfettered by strict
prompts, we could write naturally, revealing something about ourselves through
the topics we gravitated around and our preferred methods of approach. The
freedom of this assignment exposed us to our weaknesses. Because most of these
entries were self-directed, we couldn’t hide behind rationalizations like “Oh,
I didn’t really get that prompt and the story” or “It was an academic paper, so
it’s impossible not to sound stuffy and contrived.” In our blog posts, if we
felt like we weren’t effectively making the point we wanted, we couldn’t rely
on you to detect and rectify the problem. We had to figure it out for ourselves
because only we knew our point and the effect we wanted to impress on our
audience. I may be romanticizing, but I feel like this blog project really
fostered a lot of independence and personal growth!
[Suggestions for next year.]
A great addition to this assignment though would be to
encourage some communication between blogs. Language arts is about
communication after all, and seeing each other’s blogs would prompt some intellectual
discussion about either the topic or the blogger’s style. One blogger’s post
could even inspire another (Ahem, Sachin and Alex).You could start this off by
requiring students to respond to a friend’s blog post before asking them to
respond to a blog post from somebody they do not immediately sit next to in
class. This way, people are exposed to more types of writing and criticism than
they usually do in peer reviews which are usually among friends. And because you
are no longer the only one reading the blogs, students now have to pay more
attention to who their audience is. This’ll discourage negative blog posts without
actually limiting freedom; it’d be a good way to teach the mantra of “say it
only if you can take it” (though this applies to you too but really – what are
the chances of anything exploding over a blog post?).
I’ll spare the both of us a neat conclusion. I’ve already written
three whoppin’ pages now when you
only asked for paragraphs, and one of my blog posts is as long as a football
team laundry list. So blah blah blah, minimalism, full circle ending, I heart
AP Lang, have a good summer, DONE.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
[TL;DR version.]
Because you've got fifty-four bajillion more words to go!
Growth? I realized that I have too much flowery language.
Plans? Read moar.
Meaningful assignment? "iceberg theory" and blogs/journal
Suggestions? communication between student blogs. also, wordpress. blogger sucks at keeping consistent formatting which makes my OCD gland cry uniform tears at a uniform rate.
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