Writing Choices

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Writing

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We often write about writing as if there is a single thing called writing. And we get away with talking like that because all writing has enough in common that people will accept our assertions. But then we are in danger of misleading because what we say is true may be true only part of the time. In certain situations, in many situations, it is true. But in others it is wrong. So if we are to talk accurately about writing, we need to consider varying purposes, varying situations. Sometimes the writer is in control of the writing situation. What she wants is what matters. Other times the writer has little control—it's what the reader wants and demands that matters. Still other times, there is a nice blend of the two.

When the reader is in control, we have more difficulty writing because sometimes he wants what we cannot provide. On these occasions, it's like being told that we have an hour to fill a backpack for a two week trip in a wilderness area. We will have to carry everything we need in this one pack because we will be carrying it and carrying it. Some few of us are experienced enough at backpacking and sufficiently prepared to meet these extraordinary demands. The rest of us would need a herd of burros to carry all we would need and a couple of days to load them. But we might, any of us, get what we needed into that pack if we were given enough time—about two weeks. We could then go to the local wilderness store—if there is one in our area. And we could buy all the lightweight stuff—if we had the money and if we didn't have to work, or cook, or clean, or take the dog to the vet, or go to the party for Clarissa and Bob.

But no, the leader says one hour and one small backpack. So we do our best—put in food—no can goods. Aha! a box of raisins in the pantry. We put in clothes, one set of extra underwear—we will wash. We won't take a raincoat—it's not going to rain surely—nor a hair brush, and we will sleep on the ground. So we do it. We buckle up the last buckle and head out. Then the mosquitoes hit. We forgot the insect repellent. The sun burns us, and we have no face cream. And then another thing we missed and another and another.

And that's the way it is sometimes in packing and in writing. We are not in a good situation. We do the best we can, make quick decisions. Some are good, some bad—we really didn't need those house shoes, and we get very tired of just raisins. In a sense we have been set up to fail—no, that's not the right word—set up to have to choose with too little information or time, to do less well than we might have. But even when the reader gives us more opportunity, more of a chance to choose what is best, we still may make bad decisions—we may not know enough to make the right decisions: we may not know that it rains every afternoon in August in the Sacramento mountains.
We may make bad decisions because we are too unconcerned to bother to think about whether to include one thing or another. We just grab up a bunch of stuff and throw it in, push it down tight, and throw a flower on top. After all, we are the reader's favorite people. It will never rain on our parade, or wilderness trip either for that matter. And if it does, we will wait till then to complain, whine, lament, and cry, to regret even taking the trip in the first place.

But we also make bad decisions or no decisions because we are too concerned. Some of us worry and fret over every little decision—the white raisins or the dark ones, the cotton or wool socks, the dirty new sweat suit or the clean old one. Some are important decisions, some unimportant, but we worry, we fret until finally we are paralyzed, stand-ing there looking into our trunk, one item in each hand. Then we either just start throwing anything in, or we decide we didn't want to take a trip anyway. We will just stay home and take a nap. When writers reach this stage, they say they are blocked, but that's a condition with many causes.

We also become blocked when we know our reader expects more of us than we can provide. It's like needing a tux or party dress for the big formal occasion. Will the navy blue suit do? Last year's dress? Probably not. Again we fret, then at last lay what we've got in, carefully, trying not to wrinkle it—it's got to do—it's all we have. But we've seen the sit-coms. We know they'll laugh and point us out to their friends.

Often, though, we are more fortunate. The reader is our friend, and he just wants to know something of what we know about something, or maybe he just wants our opinion. Then writing is easy, with little pres-sure, just like a good easy-going pickup basketball game among friends. So we miss ten shots in a row, who's going to care tomorrow? And some-times we do our very best when we are relaxed and playing easy. The same is true of our writing. We may write better because we have no pressure, and then again we may not, but it really doesn't matter much either way, and that's nice.

And then again there's something to be said for the excitement of playing in the big game, the excitement which stimulates us to do our best work, to marshal our resources, to improve our skills.
So what are the resources we writers need when we come to face the demanding tasks of writing? As suggested by the comments above, there is a state of mind which is most conducive to writing well—being relaxed, excited, caring. But being this way will not be enough in writing, sports, or nearly anything else. Readers for the most part will only read what we write if they are rewarded for the time they spend reading. Usually that reward comes in the form of information. Readers read to learn. They want each word, each sentence to tell them something they did not know before.
So we must know something. We must also know, or make good esti-mates of, what our readers know. Then we must place these two side-by-side and select what we know that they do not know, and tell them that. I'm not talking about test taking, which is a relatively uncommon kind of writing anywhere but in schools. Instead, I'm talking about a kind of writing which is also common in schools and out, usually called exposi-tory, the kind in which it is assumed that we, the writers, have a margin of knowledge over our readers, the kind in which there is the expectation that if we don't know more, we will investigate.

Given that kind of expectations, we are going to need some time too, to sort through all that we could include and decide what to put in, then decide on what the best order will be for the items selected.
This work must be done, and must be done over and over. Even under the best of circumstances, the work is not easy. Choices must be made, many choices, and only rarely are we convinced we have made absolutely the best choice, but even so we must realize that there are so many deci-sions, so many items to include and to exclude that we can never be sure that we have chosen the best things, and what is best for one reader is not necessarily the best for another. So really there are few times that we can say that we know we have made absolutely the best choices. About all we can really say is that we gave it our best effort, that we cared, that we considered alternatives, and finally that we let it go to our readers with-out apologies, hoping for their good will, hoping that they too write enough to feel with us in our difficulties.

And the work can be made even more difficult if we have not learned some basic fundamental information about how our language works—about the structure of English. Most of us know a great deal. We know thousands of words, most rather informal but some rather technical and formal. We also know several ways to form sentences in English. What we haven't done is put what we know into any kind of systematic form so that we know the alternative ways to do certain common tasks of writing, know perhaps twenty different ways to say that one thing caused another. The primary purpose of this workbook is to teach you the different ways we connect things in English. You will be provided with information which will allow you to choose the best ways for completing your writing task.