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Title: Writing With Power: Techniques for Mastering the Writing Process by Peter Elbow ISBN: 0-19-512018-3 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 May, 1998 Format: Paperback Volumes: 1 List Price(USD): $15.95 |
Average Customer Rating: 4.62 (8 reviews)
Rating: 5
Summary: Worth it, I promise.
Comment: I have been an ardent reader all my life, as far back as I can remember. I can remember tearing through my bookcase on some days as if I was physically hungry. Books were always a source of enjoyment for me, - better than dreaming, man - but they were also always a mystery to me. How could someone do something like this? Where do people find all this incredible material inside? Reading was my joy. Writing was never that. Instead, it was always difficult, and frustrating and humiliating. Oh, my writing was all right when it was done. But it took hours piled on hours of struggle to get there. I didn't understand how writers did it, how they could create entire novels - and not just one to each author! - when it took me a week to write one silly page for a book report. And not only did it take forever; it was never fun. It was hard and brutal, exacting and costly. I thought that when you wrote something it had to come out perfect, or nearly so, the first time it was copied down.
Everything changed. This book did it for me. I read Elbow's advice on freewriting to create, how trying to edit and originate at the same time choked the spark off before it could get started. Writing freely without excruciating over what word to put where, then going back after you had some material to work with - it was revelatory. More; for the first time in my life, writing was fun. Really, really fun. It's stayed that way, in all the time since I read "Writing With Power." If I'm very lucky, it will become what I do with my life - but it is only for reading this book that I have any shot at all.
If you have any ambition at all to write, if you have ever experienced the frustration of knowing you have something to say without knowing how to say it, read this book. And start writing, right now. Just make sure you don't stop. You can always go back later.
Rating: 4
Summary: An antidote to all those rules your English teacher taught!
Comment: Before reading Elbow's book, I was quite skeptical concerning "freewriting" -- raw writing, writing without concern for the rules of grammar, writing for the sheer sake of getting words on paper. Elbow overcame my skepticism with powerful examples, reports from his own experience & that of his pupils, and clever exposition. Rather than ducking the complexities and contradictions of good writing, Elbow tackles them head-on. His strategy involves aggressively seeking counter-arguments to his suggestions, and he often admits that two opposing principles both contain elements of truth. He then gives thoughtful advice on how to cope with such complexity. Many of his guidelines involve dialectical or cyclical practices, e.g. paying attention to breathing life into your prose, but then revising for structure, and then returning once again to make sure you haven't choked the life out of what you've written.
In combination with Robert Boice's book, First-Order Principles for College Teachers, Elbow's book would make a wonderful present for a beginning academic or other professional whose livelihood depends on good writing. Graduate students in all fields would also benefit. And, of course, people who TEACH writing could find much of value in this book. Elbow, however, seems to have a dim view of many of his colleagues' tactics!
Rating: 4
Summary: Unorthodox & Helpful
Comment: In Writing with Power, Peter Elbow shares several of his thoughts on techniques for everyone and anyone who writes. Divided into several sections with titles of "Audience" and "Feedback," Elbow walks writers through every step of the writing process, including thoughts on relieving writer's block, sharing individual writing with others, and several different types of actual writing processes and revision. His unorthodox approach to teaching how to write is something that inevitably spills over into this book. Personally, I found this book to be very useful in my own personal writing. I never would have considered giving myself a set amount of time to get something done (and stopping when that time is over) or adding a dialogue to a serious paper. I would also have never given myself permission to "waste" my time on something as frivolous as freewriting to get my mind going. Writing with Power is easy to read and highly enjoyable. His suggestions are valuable and very applicable to every kind of writing. Elbow is not afraid to go out on a limb in his own writing, which only serves as proof that Elbow "practices what he preaches" - and that it can work in daily writing.
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Title: Writing Without Teachers by Peter Elbow ISBN: 0195120167 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 May, 1998 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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Title: Everyone Can Write: Essays Toward a Hopeful Theory of Writing and Teaching Writing by Peter Elbow ISBN: 0195104161 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 February, 2000 List Price(USD): $21.95 |
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Title: Thinking on Paper by V. A. Howard, J.H. Barton ISBN: 0688077587 Publisher: Quill Pub. Date: 01 February, 1988 List Price(USD): $11.00 |
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Title: On Writing Well, 25th Anniversary : The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction by William K. Zinsser ISBN: 0060006641 Publisher: HarperResource Pub. Date: 18 September, 2001 List Price(USD): $14.00 |
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Title: Writing Under Pressure: The Quick Writing Process by Sanford Kaye ISBN: 0195066618 Publisher: Oxford University Press Pub. Date: 01 November, 1990 List Price(USD): $13.95 |
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