Writing Down the (Expanded) Bones
Natalie Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones (expanded edition) was the only "textbook" I used in this term's Publication Workshop class, and it seemed to be what the students needed. Its subject is the discipline of writing, and attitudes toward the practice of writing, rather than technical details of composition. That seems to be a subject that hadn't come up in any of their other classes.
WDtB was originally published in 1986, and I had expected the updated, expanded edition to bring the essays into the age of the Internet. That didn't happen, so a few of the items are a bit dated. The expansion consists of the addition of a new preface and an interview with the author tacked on the end.
Still, there are many writing exercises proposed, along with the rationale for doing them. There's a healthy crossover between exercises aimed at poetry, or fiction, or memoir, or essay. Indeed, if one looks carefully, one suspects she sees them all as more connected than not.
There are many fine mottos and exhortations in this book, but my favorite quote is from her discussion of "showing" versus "telling" and I love the ruthlessness of her example of the failure of the latter style: "Go ahead, take Kant's Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysic and get it to show what he is telling. We would all be a lot happier."
Sadly, the solecism "honed in" appears on page 85, uncorrected from the first edition. I see that age has brought experience, but not knowledge.
CBIP: student thesis novels
WDtB was originally published in 1986, and I had expected the updated, expanded edition to bring the essays into the age of the Internet. That didn't happen, so a few of the items are a bit dated. The expansion consists of the addition of a new preface and an interview with the author tacked on the end.
Still, there are many writing exercises proposed, along with the rationale for doing them. There's a healthy crossover between exercises aimed at poetry, or fiction, or memoir, or essay. Indeed, if one looks carefully, one suspects she sees them all as more connected than not.
There are many fine mottos and exhortations in this book, but my favorite quote is from her discussion of "showing" versus "telling" and I love the ruthlessness of her example of the failure of the latter style: "Go ahead, take Kant's Prolegomena to Any Future Metaphysic and get it to show what he is telling. We would all be a lot happier."
Sadly, the solecism "honed in" appears on page 85, uncorrected from the first edition. I see that age has brought experience, but not knowledge.
CBIP: student thesis novels