A Writer’s Search for Process Literature & Language Essay

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The process of writing is something that is quite involved. It has often been said that to write properly; you need to read and read a lot. This sometimes seems backward; there is so much reading material available, that where would you even start? My preferred method is to write a little bit, to help find my style. After that, I will start reading.
My writing process takes the form of various drafts along the way. While I have a vision in my head when I begin to write, it is not always clear what that vision is. It can take several drafts for my ideas to reach what I can see inside my head.
Along the way, of course, I do like to read - both around the subject I am trying to write about myself, and people who write in what I would consider being a similar style to my own. Sometimes this is for inspiration, sometimes (if things are not going as well as I would hope) this is to see if there is anything that might help me. I most often simply read for pleasure, however.
When I write, I try and have a specific purpose to it. My final writing process might be centered around solidifying a nebulous vision, but the process of getting there is anything but nebulous. I plan everything out, and make sure that I know what I need out of any particular piece of writing.
My writing process does not normally benefit from having outside interference – I know that some people focus better with music and other things around them, but it does not work for me.
Alice Walker is known for her meditative approach to poetry, pain, and life in general. She credits meditation with helping her ability to channel these things more effectively into her writing, and into her poetry. Walker is someone who seems content to simply let words appear as they may, from the way she speaks in her article – the words are borne out of her newfound attitude to life, and not through other processes.
If the way Walker describes herself is true, then it seems as though her style would not suit mine. I do like to draft and redraft as the words on the page match the ones I have in my head, and so perhaps we are similar in that regard. I do feel that she approaches the entire process like that; this is not something I feel capable of, so I would not want to attempt anything down that train of thought.
Susan Sontag is a writer who plans her work out meticulously, and who seems to believe that the key to proper writing is reading.
''What is written without effort is in general read without pleasure,'' said Dr. Johnson, and the maxim seems as remote from contemporary taste as its author. Surely, much that is written without effort gives a great deal of pleasure.
(Sontag)
Sontag sees the entire process of writing as one which is very involved, from start to finish.
Sontag shares many of my approaches to work, including the view that reading is essential to writing, and also that rewriting is an essential part of the writing process. I find that she shares my ideas of how to form ideas and drafts and that we both see the process as enjoyable. I share Sontag’s belief that writing is the ongoing permission to be free and to show what you think in an open forum.
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