The And The Makers Eye : Revising Your Own Manuscripts By Donald Murray Essay

This article is about Richard Marius and the processes he uses in his own writings. He expresses the importance of starting with just a list, committing yourself completely to the project at hand, writing numerous rough drafts, and many other guidelines that can contribute to the process of effective writing.

Lamott compares the process of writing with the painful process of pulling the teeth. She believes that in order to produce a high quality writing, the author must first put together all their ideas and thoughts in form of the “child draft”. This draft determines the flow and dimension

It is essential to understand that classes taken in grade school do not give students a full understanding of each subject. With the topic of writing, there will always be a new lesson to learn, an aspect to improve, or a differing way to explain. Author Craig Vetter states in Bonehead Writing, “This is your enemy: a perfectly empty sheet of paper. Nothing will ever happen here except what you make happen.” Each story, essay, or response comes from a writer’s experiences. With each attempt at a new piece comes an underlying story of emotions the writer is facing. Each person’s writing is unique and the ideas people have are related to their past experiences and what they believe to be familiar with when deciding which writing style to use. As a high school student, I have learned many things about writing that helped me become the improved writer I am today, but the most essential advice I have received is practice makes perfect. Although there is no actual perfect way of writing, I have discovered that each essay I write, my writing improves. It is easier to spot mistakes, find areas to improve, and ponder elevated word choice to use.

In chapter 3 of Everyone’s an Author, the main purpose is to discuss the writing process and its components. The chapter emphasizes the idea that practice makes perfect and it may take time and patience to find the writing process that works well for you. In order to find a writing process that leads to you working the most efficiently, one must approach their writing and take note of the habits they make, and analyze whether or not they work well.

In Anne Lamott’s essay, “Shitty First Drafts,” she explains her writing philosophy of just getting ideas down on paper and then editing them later. While some disagree with this method, such as George Dila in his critical response, “Rethinking the Shitty First Draft,” many writers employ this technique to not only better their writing, but to overcome obstacles in the writing process. Even the most successful of writers will say that they actually hate writing, Lamott even compares it to pulling teeth. The intimidation of just starting to write becomes too much and leads writers to procrastinate. For many, an overwhelming, overbearing sense of perfectionism creeps in and creates anxiety and often lead to writer’s block. Everyone writes first drafts, but if a writer allows themselves to let go of all personal judgment and permits their writing to be “bad,” then they will most likely end up with great ideas that they did not even know were inside their heads. Once these ideas are allowed to flow out, then it becomes easier to visualize a realistic way of developing them into a full composition. By writing inferior first drafts, writers can focus on and express their ideas while overcoming the difficulties typically associated with the writing process.

In the article Teaching Writing as a Process Not Product by Donald M. Murray, Murray argues that writing is a process of discovery not an end product. Rather than being criticized for a “perfect product” by the teachers, student should be provided with an environment of creativity to explore and discover. Murray states that many teachers focus on the end product rather than teaching students the process of writing in order to receive a better product. The writing process has three stages of writing which include: prewriting, writing, and rewriting. In the prewriting stage, students should take about 85% of their time dedicated to the writing process. Prewriting includes strategies such as daydreaming, note taking, outlining, and lead-writing. Next is the writing stage where it should take about one percent of a student’s time. The writing stage is where students produce their first draft. Finally, it is the

While attending writing class, I learned about the 4 steps in writing, bases for revising, organizing, and connecting specific information, and I also learned about the different types of essays such as descriptive, narrative, process, cause and effect and argumentative essay. I have been a student at Milwaukee Area Technical College for 1 semester, and over the course of my enrollment I have grown and learned more that I knew prior to attending this writing course. Participating in this writing class has taught me so much more than stuff about literature and language, it has taught me another way of expressing myself. I have learned here how to write and express myself, how to think for myself, and how to find the answers to the things that I don 't know. Most importantly I have learned how important technique, outlines and organization are. My goal in this paper is to inform writers about how my writing skills have improved.

Peter Elbow (b.1935) is an author and professor, who wrote “Writing without Teachers” which was last published in 1998. Elbow’s essay “Freewriting” talks about why we should freewrite and it’s benefits. Elbow said, “ The habit of compulsive, premature editing doesn’t just make writing hard. It also makes writing dead.” This means that when you're writing you should continue to write and finish, before you start to critique yourself because it could lead to a “dead” essay. One interesting detail, is when Elbow said, “Freewritings are vacuums. Gradually you will begin to carry over into your regular writing some of the voice, force, and connectedness that creep into those vacuums.” Freewriting lets you express yourself and through time that voice will start to creep into regular writing.

Within the past eight weeks, I have realized my strengths and weaknesses within the writing process. I have realized that I do not utilize the first step within the writing process of prewriting. However, for the drafting, revising, and polishing steps of the writing process, I am very familiar and use additional resources to strengthen the writing assignment. I create multiple drafts, which includes revising and polishing in each step. Therefore, I use all three of these steps in multiple drafts as I reach the final product for

Everyone has their own sound in their writing, which is what makes them unique and have a great final draft. Peter Elbow believes that these freewriting exercises will help everyone become a better writer.

Everyone knows what writing is to one extent or another, but we all have different definitions of how it should be done and varying degrees of seriousness about the art. We all have a process of writing, but each is unique to ourselves and our own experiences. Annie Dillard and Stephen King are two well known authors who have published many pieces, two of which describe how they view the writing process and let their readers get a peek of what goes on through their minds when they write. These two pieces are Dillard’s The Writing Life and King’s “What Writing Is.”

When it comes to critical thinking, reading and writing are two factors that deal with the critical thinking process. A few key aspects of critical reading and writing are identifying the tone in ones writing, how to throughly read and annotate a text, and the revision process. In the essay, “The Maker’s Eye”, Donald Murray explains how the attitude of a writer, listening to what readers have to say and how to edit your own writing makes your work better when critically thinking in college. These aspects of critical thinking, reading and writing make will keep the reader interested and make the writing easier to translate when read.

In this article Elbow tell us that some people are good at writers. However we have to learn how to be a good writer within our hearts not by what your teachers says. Their was some parts that i did not undersatnd when he used the phrase " Once there was a land where people felt helpless about trying to touch the floor without bending their knees". I did not understand what Elbow was trying to tell me. Yes most of the Elbows ideas has help me by first of figuring out the meaning of my writing, and of how to put it into my own words. I did agree that everybody struggles to began writing even if you a good writer or

Drafting is a complex process of writing that all writers, professionals and amateurs, can identify with. Since there are infinite interpretations a piece of work can be interpreted by, writers often scrutinize their work and modify it to their "perfection" during the draft process. In "The Makers Eye: Revising Your Own Manuscript," the author reveals that in order to write a successful piece of work, writers need to produce a series of drafts. Each draft can be changed and rearranged to be

I have always enjoyed writing, and I believed writing was a subject I was naturally good at. I turned in papers that were still rough drafts, I did not evaluate my sources, nor did I ever take the time to fully understand the prompt. It was not until my first semester of college, in my writing composition course, I realized that I had a lot of work ahead of me to be as good a writer as I thought I was. In the writing course, the students were required to compose several essays using different methods to help progress on the course objectives. The work in this portfolio demonstrates that I have used the methods of synthesis and evaluation of sources to advance my critical thinking skills and develop personal responsibility. Though I have