Two of my best blog friends have posted interesting writing ideas yet. I’m going to point them out to you so you can go and check them out.
First of all, mrschili, across in her inner door blog, picked up an idea from a fellow blogger (wordlily), about writing a six word autobiography. The results are fascinating and enlightening. Try it for yourself. What would your six word autobiography be?
Secondly, Dr Tom Bibey, posted about writing a single paragraph entitled Where I Come From. His short paragraph about his origins and influences has gone on to inspire several others. Check them out. And, then……..yep, try it out for yourself. What would your write for “Where I Come From”?
I dunno, Bob, something tells me any six word biography or short autobiographical feature on yours truly would include too many hoary cuss words and self-slanders for the average reader to safely absorb. Exercises like the ones you describe are fine but let’s just make that the starting point for the DAILY act of writing. Robert Penn Warren called it “the pain I can’t live without”. Don’t let another day slip by without experiencing the exquisite agony of putting your thoughts down on paper, writing “in defiance of all the world’s muteness” (Nabokov)…
Oh yes! I LOVE those quotes!
Thankyou Cliff.
I agree – since I started doing the “morning pages” exercise I get twitchy if I haven’t sat myself and done some writing first thing. Also I find that since I started blogging I get equally twitchy if I haven’t written a post at some point in the day.
Thanks for you comment
I remember in Jr. High a teacher asked a boy who he was, and he said, “Jerry.”
She said, “No Jerry, who are you REALLY?”
He was confused and looked around the class for support. Finally he answered, “I’m Jerry. I live over on Peach Street.” He didn’t understand the question, or know anyone else to be.
Even after all these years all I know to write about is Tom Bibey, ’cause that’s all I am.
Dr. B
I found the six-word autobiography to be profoundly unsatisfying. I’m not sure that the entirety of a lifetime (thus far, of course) can be adequately captured in half a dozen words. I LIKED my words, mind you, but they only got to part of my story.
The exercise over at Doc. Bibey’s was a bit better, at least in terms of getting closer to who I am. I really DO feel that part of my identity is tied to my environment, and I have a strange relationship with New England. I think that Nathaniel Hawthorne said it better than I ever could, and I wrote about that here:
http://theinnerdoor.wordpress.com/2007/09/09/home/
I MUST write. I’ve been blogging every day for almost a year and a half straight. Sometimes, I don’t know what I really think or feel about a thing until I write about it. I’m often surprised to find things in my writing that I never intended to put there, but that bubbled their way up through my hands and onto the page. I find myself composing in my mind, and I often try to put my experiences into words that I can use to share them with others. I wrote about my need to be a writer here:
http://theinnerdoor.wordpress.com/2006/12/02/the-artist-and-the-art/
I’m really not trying to pimp out my own blog here, honestly, but these are thoughts that I visit often, and I’m pleased by how well these particular of my efforts tell these parts of my story.
Thanks for embedding those links to your posts mrschili. I enjoyed reading both of them.
I share your compulsion to write.
I agree, of course, that six words will never be enough to capture a life, but it’s interesting to attempt to focus on such a small phrase…..actually, I’m going to guess that for most people it’s the thinking about it that is better than the end result. It was almost like trying to write a haiku – well, precis of a haiku!
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