The Explorers of Inner Space (Dial, 1968; CE 58.6, Sept. 1969): 908-911

Notes from 9/22/17 (reading Dial version)

He does mention the word process: "For the writer, writing is a process..." (908)
No mention of conference-teaching

Attempts to answer the questions:

1. Why do writers write?
2. When writers write, what do they do?

Does not explicitly suggest implications for the TEACHING of writing.

Context of the article/exigence: "The first two sentences of this article came to me weeks after I was invited by a student of mine, English teacher Carol Hovland, to write for the Concord Dial, the student literary magazine at Concord-Carlisle Massachusetts, High School. [...] Almost a year earlier, Reader's Digest editor, James Monahan, had suggested a somewhat similar article, but I was deep in a book about writing and it would not come. (2)

This is an article that, at least at the outset, is principally concerned with threshold concept 1.1 Writing is a Knowledge-Making Activity.

There is a mystery in this process... (1)
Something happens as the pen point scratches against the paper that they cannot quite explain. (2)

For the writer, writing is a process, a way of seeing, of hearing what he has to say to himself, a means of discovering meaning. (1)

Hadn't thought of this before, but what happens on p. 2, with the line "The first two sentences of this article..." is an important moment in that, up to this point, Murray is just writing an article about writing. After this moment, though, he is writing an article about writing while simultaneously reflecting on its writing, on how it was written. There is a kind of "breaking the fourth wall" moment here, I think. So, ostensibly, this is an article about the idea of writing-as-act-of-discovery, but it's also a commentary on the process of writing an article on the idea of writing-as-act-of-discovery.

craft and art (p. 3)

On the process: "The writer's steps are never steps; they do not occur simultaneously or separately; they do not always occur in the same order. [...] And yet, there are some stages of this chaotic evolution which can be identified and understood. (p 3)

First, the writer has a hint of a subject. (p. 3) [...] The writer usually has an audience in mind.

Murray articulates the writing process at this time as "find a subject, an audience, specifics, a form, commitment" and editing  (p. 4)

Writing is an act of identity: "There are rewards, for one of the most exciting things that happens when we discover what we have said is that we discover who we are. In finding your voice, you discover your identity. (p. 4)

Earlier Notes:

Here, I stumble across a simple idea, or the expression of a simple idea, that revolutionized my thinking about writing and dominated my teaching of writing for many years:

The layman believes--and often writes badly himself because of it--that the writer has a complete thought or vision he merely copies down, acting as a stenographer for the muse. A few writers on rare occasions have reported such an experience--but only after years of thinking, reading, and craftsmanlike writing. For most writers the act of putting words on paper is not the recording of a discovery but the very act of exploration itself. (italics added, 908)

We also note the beginning of Murray's summoning of evidence. What is the evidence for his claims about writing? One form of evidence comes in the form of the recorded thoughts of published writers on what they do. In the second paragraph of this piece, we get: Updike, Frost, Faulkner. I had never really thought about this before. On one level, it makes sense to go to the professionals to hear what they do. They are to serve as models, in a way. And we do this in many realms of our life--we watch professional tennis players or golfers swing their rackets and/or clubs to see what we can learn from them.

But on another front, there is a problem. For Updike is a novelist, essayist, and poet, Frost is a poet, and Faulkner is a novelist. To what extent does or should the creative writer serve as the voice of expertise or authority on the craft of writing--non creative writing? Does the poet have anything to offer the businessman writing a proposal or memo? Does the novel have anything to offer the professor writing a lab report or the journalist writing an op-ed piece? An analogy (?): going to creative writers like Frost/Updike/Faulkner may be like the tennis player going to an athlete to learn about playing tennis. In other words, there are many kinds of athletes, just like there are many kinds of writers. Just watching some athletes is not going to help you get better at your specific sport. (not sure this works). Finally, it's worth noting that many of the writers upon whom he calls for guidance are men (Twain, Hemingway, etc.).

Trope: writing is a voyage/odyssey/discovery/journey.

We see the phrase: "writing is a process" (908).

Second form of evidence: his own process ("The first two sentences of this article came to me..." [909])

Notable phrases:

"I tried to protect myself in a way they cannot completely understand, allowing my subconscious to work, avoiding involvement, waiting for the moment when the line tightens and I must draw in my catch. (All metaphors are dangerous or I would describe the feeling of the growing idea as intellectual indigestion, a strange, rumbling, eruptive discomfort.)" (909)

Key terms: discover, surprise, disappointment, pride, learn.

Attitude/tone/ethos: There is this toughness thing going on in much of his writing that I think comes from popular or famous writers but also, perhaps, from Murray himself, a tough guy. It is a sort of masculine ethos--courage, bravery. These are just two traits of the writer. The writer is someone who is "facing it." Murray claims a masculine way of thinking about writing. Murray says things like :

He begins to discover what he has said and, therefore, what he has to say by subjecting himself to his own critical eye, and perhaps the eyes of others who are not blinded by maternity. (italics added, 910)

I love the little jab at the end there--your mother is always going to love you, but she's not going to be critical of you in the way that you need to be if you want to be a writer (or a man).

Now, as I come to the end of this article, still another private experiment with the process of writing, I begin to see, like a photograph slowly evolving in the developer--shadow turning into line--what I have to say because I have dared to try to say it. (italics added, 911)

I love the verb dare here. It suggests the risk involved. Writing is risky. It takes courage. It's a form of battle, almost. Why? What's the pay-off?

THE NEW MASCULINITY--interesting to note Murray's own masculinity, a WWII vet and all that comes with being a male member of that generation of men. Yet his teaching career spanned the 1960s/1970s, a time of changing gender mores. I think on one hand that Murray embraced this, but on another hand, I'm not sure he was able to stop being the tough guy who fought the good fight. Seeking the approval of other men.

The quotes he uses from famous writers sometimes do this work for him. Here's one from Hemingway:

"'I rewrote the ending to Farewell to Arms, the last page of it, thirty-nine times before I was satisfied.' The Paris Review interviewer asked, 'Was there some technical problem there? What was it that had you stumped?' And Hemingway answered, 'Getting the words right.'" (911)

Murray (and I) love the toughness of that passage. There is a masochism to it. 39 times. I did 39 push ups. 39 sit-ups. Ran 39 miles. Why? To get it right? Men take pleasure in this kind of masochism--doing something over and over again because you must. Because it's necessary to get things "right."

The work is like exercise in a way. Murray is drawing on the language of a kind puritan ethos around training the self, discipline. It's about discipline:

I have polished, shaped, cut down, and built up this article during a dozen readings and rereadings. I don't always enjoy this process for I am lazy, but it is necessary. It comes with the territory. The writer knows he has to make the stubborn personal effort by sweat to discover his meaning so that he will find out precisely what he has said. (italics 911)

I love the word "necessary." Men do what is necessary, that's what makes us men and not...sissies? Women? Children? I love that he concedes laziness. I love the fact that he uses the word sweat. I am reminded of all those late 19th/early 20th century books on body-building. The movement to train the body, to use the body to prove masculinity. Kimmel talks a good deal about this. And here, it seems Murray is doing the same thing with what was, perhaps, a feminine thing--writing. He's making it manly. Manly writing. It's not pretty and flowery and dainty. It's a masculine, strong exercise in discipline and restraint and bravery and courage. Is the write always afraid of being called a sissy? Is writing a sissy thing to do? Murray brings the swagger and bravado of the soldier and newspapermen to his instruction. There is nothing unmanly about writing. And yet, I wonder how his words speak to women? Has any woman written a feminist critique of Murray's work? Of the metaphors he uses and the language and the way he describes the process. It would be interesting to look at those body-building guides from the early 20th century and the way they talk about training the body and compare the language to that which Murray uses in his piece. It's there. Toughness. Discipline. Anti-softness.

Style is not a fashionable garment you put on; style is what you are; what you have to say as well as how you say it. We admire people who are natural, who are themselves, and the best way to know yourself and your own world may be to try and write it down. (911)

Masculine metaphors:

The writer is a cold executive, making a thousand decisions in a paragraph, hiring one word, firing another. (911)

He is a craftsman who hones a phrase, reads a sentence aloud, moves a word, fits in an idea shapes a paragraph, scene, or chapter. (911)