The writing process

Anne Lamott writes, "Almost all good writing begins with terrible first efforts. You need to start somewhere. Start by getting something- anything- down on paper. A friend of mine says the first draft is the down draft- you just get it down. The second draft is the up draft- you fix it up. You try to say what you have to say more accurately. And the third draft is the dental draft, where you check every tooth, to see if its loose or cramped or decayed, or even, God help us, healthy" (p.25).

I chose this passage for a few reasons, the first reason I chose it is because I feel very strongly that this is the best way to produce a paper. I think that people try too hard to write a perfect first paper and they lose substance because of it. When a writer is allowed to think freely about their ideas without worrying too much about sentence structure or punctuation they will be able to express their thoughts more vividly. I also like how Lamott uses the second draft not as a final draft but as a "fix it up draft". I think this is important because many times writers will use their second draft as a final draft but this does not give them enough time or editing to create their best piece. The third draft he calls the "dental draft" because this is where you can go through and make all the final changes to make sure that it is the best piece you can turn in. I think this is really important because at this point the paper is in its final stages and should be relatively organized and clear. This third process allows a writer to go through and make sure all the I's are dotted and T's are crossed.

The second reason I chose to talk about this passage is because it directly relates to what we are doing in class right now and it's very interesting to see the process put down in writing. When we were asked to write our rough drafts for the literacy vignette I thought really hard about what Lamott says about first drafts and tried to keep it in the back of my mind while writing my paper. It was very hard for me not to go back and re-read each sentence to make sure it was written correctly or fit in to my story. However, once I made myself just continue writing without re-reading I was able to get a lot more ideas down and I actually found that I was able to write more ideas in a more efficient time.

This passage spoke to me because of the clever way that he explained each draft of writing and because when I think about the times I have written my best pieces they have always resulted from going through this process. It is important as a writer to have a specific plan while writing a paper and Lamott lays out a great plan to do so. I am really enjoying Lamott's outlook on writing and even more so am enjoying his sarcastic and entertaining way of writing himself.