Rambling Reads: Naked, Drunk, and (finally) Reading
Welcome to Rambling Reads! Rambling Reads is an ad-hoc book club, and for the next couple of months we are reading Naked, Drunk, and Writing, by Adair Lara. You are welcome to join in at any time – read along if you like, add your comments to these posts and/or write a post on your own blog and link up here. And if you like, take a button, courtesy of the lovely and talented Lynn:
This week’s focus is on chapters 1-3:
- Part 1 – Writing Down Your Stories
- Chapter 1: That Which Is Most Personal Is Most Common
- Chapter 2: Hot Heart, Cold Eye: The Inconvenient Importance of Craft
- Part 2 – The Personal Essay
- Chapter 3: Elements of the Successful Essay
It’s ironic, but here I am reading a book about writer’s craft, and this post will be completely devoid of anything approaching structure. Here are some bits that jumped out at me, and what I thought about them.
That which is personal is most common
That’s a quote from Carl Jung, and it’s also the title of the first chapter. It grabbed my attention because, well, isn’t that what blogging is all about? A personal blog, at any rate. And I’ve certainly found that, when I work up the nerve to get really personal, those seem to be the posts that strike a nerve in others, too.
500 words
Lara and her friend Cynthia hatched a plan while they were both working as magazine editors: to write 500 words every weekday, and exchange them. Then each would highlight passages they liked from the other’s work:
I’d rarely shown my work to people before, outside of school, because you only showed people stuff you thought was good. Now I gave Cynthia any old dashed-off thing – not because it was good, but because it was due.
Kinda like this post, come to think of it.
I also love what they did with each other’s pieces: take a yellow highlighter and highlight passages that they liked. If you need a yellow highlighter, I have one I can lend you. (I also have green, blue, and pink. No really, take one!)
This sounds like a neat exercise to me. 500 words a day is a little intimidating, but then, if it really can be “any old thing”… It’s a thought. And aside from making her write, Lara found that the exercise brought something else to her writing:
I realized that I’d been missing the necessary other half of the writing process: the pleased reader.
Now that’s a sentiment that any blogging comment-junkie can sympathize with.
Your name in print
Lara describes her first real writing gig:
I was so excited at having a byline in the section that got more jam stains and crumbs on it than anything else in the Bay Area that I’d talk the proprietor at the corner store into selling me the Sunday paper early. “The sports page not here yet!” he’d object, and I’d have to practically jerk the thing out of his hands. I’d stand there on the sidewalk, forcing people to go around me, while I read my own piece – or rather my own name – over and over with a joy that seemed to start in my toes.
This reminded me of a writing workshop I attended recently, given by Tudor Robins (and hosted by the just-as-lovely-as-Lynn Finola). Tudor described the pleasure she got from putting her own work onto her e-reader – and thus seeing your name in print has suddenly gotten a whole lot easier 
. I still have to try this!
When you finish this book
“When you finish this book,” Lara writes, “you’ll know how to write essays and memoirs, how to keep writing when you’re discouraged, how to revise your work, and how to get it published.” Well, all I can say is I wish I could get through this book and a 1200-word essay between now and next week: I have a piece I would very much like to submit to Canada Writes. If Lara can show me how to keep writing when I’m discouraged, well, the woman is a miracle-worker.
“Easy reading is damn hard writing”
Another quote, this time from Nathaniel Hawthorne. And so so so true. So let me apologize, as I scrawl this madly on Wednesday night in an effort to get it done for Thursday morning: I’m damn sure this one ain’t easy reading. I’ll be lucky if I manage a spell check before I hit publish 
.
Practice, practice, practice
Lara writes:
There’s nothing like writing a column twice a week for twelve years to teach you the importance of craft. Like an essay, a column isn’t a blog, a blurt, or a blast. It has to have several elements: a story to tell, a way to tell it, and a reason to tell it.
Hey, did she just let me off the hook there? This is just a blog, after all. She also tells me that “first drafts will probably be random, jumbled, and contradictory.” Excellent. Yup, totally off the hook. Also? I need to relax about my first drafts.
And speaking of letting myself off the hook, I am officially going to end it there – that’s the first two chapters – and save the “Elements of a Successful Essay” for another post. Like I said in my first post – this is the ad-hoc book club. Totally casual.
What are your thoughts on craft?
Does it matter when it’s ‘just’ a blog?
Other places I ramble
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15 Comments
The quote from Carl Jung rings true. Until recently, I’ve had a hard time getting personal on my blog. It just leaves you so naked but then there is a wealthy reward for revealing sides of yourself you keep private. That’s certainly something I’ve learned to embrace.
I’ll look into buying the this book -sounds interesting!
I tend to vacillate – lots of times I’ll try writing something personal, and think “my god, who on earth would want to read this drivel?!” But the times I’ve worked up the nerve to post it, I’ve always found the response to be amazing. I guess the people who think it’s drivel are nice enough to just roll their eyes and move on
[...] I’ve attended a few blogging conferences where the speakers have all said unequivocally that your best writing – as in the writing your readers will respond to the most – comes from sharing your personal experiences. This advice also rings very nicely with a post that Sasha wrote at Rambling Notebook on the writing process. [...]
I had a blog for 8 years, and I agree that it’s a great way to write your daily words and get feedback from an audience. At the same time, I started to feel after a while like my blog writing wasn’t accumulating into a body of work and that it was another procrastination tool–one that I could use to say “I’m writing” when I really wasn’t advancing my writing career. I still think blogging is a great tool (I miss it), but I think it’s good to have a solid plan in place for moving other projects along as you go.
Ouch. Your procrastination comment may not have been aimed at me, but THAT certainly rings true. Like any blogger, I’m sure, I always have a stack of draft posts on the go. And like any mom, very little time to do anything with them. But somehow they get prioritized over other writing… I don’t have a writing career that I’m looking to advance, but there still is other writing I’d like to be getting to…
I’ve only been blogging for a couple of years, and I had already freed myself from the idea that I was ever going to have a writing career, so it’s been pure pleasure – a creative outlet, a new fantastic community, and the chance to discover that so many things I thought made me a misfit freak are actually not that uncommon at all. But when I was trying to write short stories, the first draft was hideously painful. I couldn’t even let myself finish a sentence without second-guessing. This is some good advice.
I agree – I love blogging, for all the reasons you list here. I wish I had discovered this community earlier!! It saved my sanity after my second baby was born, I only wish I had had the same support/outlet for my first!
I found this really interesting Sasha as I’m always really nervous about anyone reading what I write – more so if I know them or they know me. The anonymity of blogging helps a little, but I still do worry a lot about what people think of my words (more than the content – strangely!).
I think it’s important for blogs to be written well as I’ve tended to have given up on those that aren’t.
Deb
I know what you mean, Deb. My online and offline lives have begun to collide lately, and I have to admit that that occasionally makes me uncomfortable. But you have been getting very personal on your blog recently! (Still need to catch up, though – your latest post struck close to home and I want quiet time just to read it, much less respond). Kudos if that is something that’s hard for you (for me, I’d say it depends on the topic).
I agree on the writing front – good writing is just easier to read.
I’ll be picking up the book tomorrow – had to order it. I do believe that we all have much more in common than we often think. And when we write about the truest stuff, that’s when we connect the most deeply with others, with readers. Can’t wait to dive in and read! Will come back and post more over the weekend.
Yay! You won’t be disappointed, the only thing stopping me from reading it cover-to-cover is trying to take the time to make notes so that I can blog about it (not a bad thing, it gives me the time to think more about the content, too). There are a few people just picking up the book now, and while everyone is free to go at their own pace, I think I’ll use that as an excuse to stretch out my own schedule a bit…
Firstly, I LOVE your new look here Sasha. It looks awesome!!
Secondly, I need to buy this book, and then read it too. It sounds like it would be a really inspiring one. Thanks for posting this and I can’t wait to catch up.
Thanks Finola! I was really hooked on the idea of making my own theme, featuring a spiral notebook, but honestly graphic design is just not my forte and so I figured I should hunt around. There are a lot of options out there for free themes, once you’re self hosted!! I do like this one.
The book is great, I don’t think you’ll be disappointed. And don’t worry too much about catch-up, I think I’m going to re-jig my own schedule a bit, given that I’m already a chapter ‘behind’, and since it looks like Lynn is going to buy a copy too I won’t worry so much anymore about library loan terms.
Looking forward to hearing your comments!
I’m really loving the book – I think I will buy my own copy. It’s a fun read and also full of concrete tips. I have to admit that I have struggled with chapter one, though, which also talks about finding a turning point or key realization point in your life. I’m drawing a total blank – has nothing of interest or self-growth really happened to me in all these years? Hm. I think I might make a whole post on this subject alone.
I think this book – which talks about personal essays – is so perfectly applicable to the blog format. I definitely think that blog posts can be quality writing, meaningful art, and important – even if they are just about a snippet in the life of a suburban mom. Implementing the ideas in this book could turn us all into “real” writers – just by blogging.
Yay!!! It reels you in, doesn’t it? I really didn’t expect to get hooked, I borrowed it because the title was just so shamelessly marketable, I honestly expected to be disappointed. Now that everyone’s buying a copy, I’m starting to think I should contact the publisher for a commission
.
I agree about personal essays & blog posts – I believe I was searching for personal essays & related material when I came across this in the OPL catalogue.
I wouldn’t fret about the epiphanies, if you let it stew for a while I’ll bet you’ll think of something, probably several somethings. I know I’ve had one or two, well, epiphany epiphanies recently – they slapped me on the face when I least expected, and said “duh! what about me???”.