In two ways Anne Lamott ( "Shitty First Drafts" ) and William Zinsser ( "Simplicity" ) agree in their texts about the question “How do I write good stuff”. They both agree that writers are not born as writers and writing is not a natural trait. Writing is hard work and requires a lot of time, effort, good ideas and skills. As well, they both try to make us read their articles by mentioning reality. They say things that are true, but that not many people are aware of, like the fact that writing a book doesn´t happen in one week and takes more than one try to complete it.
William
Zinsser, a well-educated editor who wrote his text for students like me, says
it´s all about editing. “Clutter is the disease of American writing.” Unnecessary
words, long sentences, circular constructions, meaningless jargon; these are
all symptoms of this widespread, epidemic illness. But as long as it exists,
people find some good medications to recover and get immune: easy, short and
descriptive words and sentences. Crossing out wasted words and phrases makes
paragraphs clear and understandable. As well, a writer has to ask himself: “What
am I trying to say and do I say it in the possibly best way?” rather than “Have
I said it?” Phrases have to be well- structured and clear to not distract the “30-seconds-attention-span”
of the reader.
In contrast to Zinsser (deductive), Lamott uses the inductive method of writing, starting
with some evidence and concluding to a certain statement. Since her article was
written for the general public and published in a book ( "Bird by Bird" ),
the tone is more casual and figurative. She argues to: “Let it all pour out” what comes to your mind; no one is going to
see your shitty first drafts. She speaks from experience when she mentions that
ALL first drafts are chaotic, unorganized, unstructured, uncensored, too
personal and too long. But there is, obviously, a way to fix that: sit down the
next day, go through it, take a pen, cross things out, add others, and maybe
even find hidden ideas and ways to express something. All you need to do is start
somewhere and put ANYTHING down on paper (or computer or whatever)! Just get it
down… it´s all about the process. Then you have time to fix it and make it appropriate
for your specific audience.
After reading both texts, I tend to compare my writing methods to Anne Lamott´s. To “brainstorm” is a great way to organize thoughts and ideas. Usually I start with dividing an assignment into different parts and getting down anything I know about it (like thinking aloud), followed by some research to complete my lack of knowledge. My next step is to connect everything, to divide it in paragraphs, and to make it sound “all right”. Correcting, crossing out, and adding words, checking the spelling, and grammar: those are the last steps to the final product. Zinsser´s arguments are not very convincing to me. Maybe because I am that kind of person who rather adds words to make my essays longer and more complex. But I guess that differs from writer to writer.
After reading both texts, I tend to compare my writing methods to Anne Lamott´s. To “brainstorm” is a great way to organize thoughts and ideas. Usually I start with dividing an assignment into different parts and getting down anything I know about it (like thinking aloud), followed by some research to complete my lack of knowledge. My next step is to connect everything, to divide it in paragraphs, and to make it sound “all right”. Correcting, crossing out, and adding words, checking the spelling, and grammar: those are the last steps to the final product. Zinsser´s arguments are not very convincing to me. Maybe because I am that kind of person who rather adds words to make my essays longer and more complex. But I guess that differs from writer to writer.
“If you find writing is hard, it´s because it is hard.” (William Zinsser)
