“Shitty First Drafts” Anne
Lemott
Anne Lemott discusses the constant difficulty of writing a
first draft. Though a professional writer, she expresses the constant
difficulty of facing a blank page.
At the beginning of her essay she brings along potential writers
that all writing takes effort. She acknowledges to some that writing may seem
effortless to professional writers who have this wealth of knowledge
and talent and that words just flow natural from them without much effort other than to
write them down.
She describes it as “…fantasy of the uninitiated.”
Her process is to write everything down
knowing that no one really is going to see it. Just start it, as if it was “child’s
play” and pour out what ever may come… even “Mr. Poopy pants”.
The point I believe she is making is just start, don’t get
bogged down in too much pre-thinking. No first draft in reality is meant
for public reading, rather it is an exercise in just getting going on it, have some fun,
look for things to expand on later.
While reading Anne Lemotts essay, it reminds me of Julia
Cameron’s “the Artist Way”
in that Cameron sets up exercises for blocked “creative’s” to three pages of
stream of consciousness writing. The idea is just to write and through that act
of writing you will find what possibly is stopping you.
As a painter, I can understand what Lemott means. It’s the “blank
canvas”, when face with a blank canvas what are going to do? You get it dirty,
throw a colored wash on it, scribble on a page whatever, and just to have it
not blank and intimidating.
(note: I am not sure that this is what the Assignment was. I couldn't find it on the blog page, so went on the internet and found "Shitty First Draft " there.)
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