Word After Word

Writing by Hand

January 25th, 2008 | Category: Teaching "The Practice Of Creative Writing", For Hope Students, Writing


It’s the difference between store bought cookies and from scratch. Everyone can tell. 

 

In the class where I fast read the first drafts, three stood out. It wasn’t necessarily that they were better (Lauren’s piece was awesome,

Virginia’s totally rocked,

Coco had amazing characters, etc.). But these three stories had a special quality, a depth and resonance that all literature has. I put the three stories that had this quality on a separate pile. Green lights.

 

As the students were working, I went around the room and asked these three authors—did you write this by hand?

 

Yes.

Yes.

and

Yes.

 

100% accuracy. It was wild. I couldn’t believe it. The three stories that stood out (still plenty of things to work on, but they had that total engagement with the present sensory moment we’ve been working so hard to achieve, and the other stories did not have that quality).

 

So then I asked Lauren and

Coco and

Virginia. “You all working by hand? Or on the computer. I’m curious.” Each of these three writers said, “A little by hand, mostly on the computer.”

 

I stopped the class. “We have to talk,” I said. “Are any of you working on the computer? Drafting your piece there?”

 

Every single other student in the class raised a hand. All the other pieces—red light pieces—were composed on the computer where it is too easy to rush, too easy to delete, too easy to overwork a passage, to easy to write straight from the head blah blah blah.

 

Astounding. It was so easy to tell the difference. There was no grey area, there was nowhere to hide.

 

4 Comments so far

  1. bjb January 25th, 2008 3:02 pm

    Hmmm, and I compose 100 percent on the computer. Maybe that’s the problem.

    Where does a typewriter fall in this continuum? Like halfway between writing by hand and word processing?

  2. Zarzana's Writers' Workshop February 4th, 2008 5:00 pm

    We polled our class of 6 people today:
    teacher-by hand
    students-4 by hand, 2 computer, and one also uses a white board for story structure and timeline, anything that’s not actually body (he has 3!)

  3. WFFrederick.com » Blog Archive » Find Your Writing Voice March 13th, 2008 5:03 pm

    […] off the computer when writing and write with pen and paper. As author and teacher, Heather Sellers points out, “Writing by hand is the difference between store bought cookies and from scratch. […]

  4. WFFrederick.com » Blog Archive » Find Your Writing Voice March 13th, 2008 5:03 pm

    […] off the computer when writing and write with pen and paper. As author and teacher, Heather Sellers points out, “Writing by hand is the difference between store bought cookies and from scratch. […]

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