Reading Response

I enjoyed Tom French's Sequencing: Text as Line and I don't know why. Before, very recently in fact, it was hard to stomach an essay on writing that dealt with structure, especially if within the essay there was some sort of bulletting, outlining, or numbering. It is a good sign, I suppose, that I now find this useful, entertaining even and that somewhere in my brain little neurons are lighting up and energetically digesting and even applying the information to something I am currently working on. For example, every time someone we read reiterates the zoom in, zoom out concept, I think about the major problem with most of my work- a lack of show, too much tell. Having a name for what I can do to remedy that problem is useful and I think about the process I took to improve my personal essay, adding details, imagining scenes, using my memories to zoom into that time in my life, using perspective to zoom out. It gives power to my writing. That is why I like it, I suppose, I feel more in control and of course we all like to feel in control.

I also enjoyed Guillermoprieto's discussion of why he uses "I" to tell the truth in his stories. He claims that it helps to push readers out of their comfort zones, to see and taste and hear just as he did. It makes it real, it makes it alive and TRUE. Along that same vein, however, I also think it is way easier to seem as if you are telling the truth if you use "I." It is hard to argue with the subject, the author, if they have been there, tasting a food you have never tasted, describing its flavor. You have to take their world on the facial expressions of the accused mass murderer and what they might mean. The use of "I" is a big responsibility--you are taking the reader into your world and shaping it, manipulating it, sometimes quite deliberately.

I thought "Memory" was a good story for examples of creating characters and setting and also for using direct quotes. Marin, did you pick this piece for Marni? I am looking forward to the discussion in class. :)