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AUTHOR'S NOTE: The piece you are about to read, entitled I Am Not Myself Today, was the introduction to the essay
collection I submitted as my final project for Advanced
Composition, English 314, Spring Quarter, 1985, at Central
Washington University. I have included this piece here, not to
drag you the scrapbook of my early life and have you ooh and
awe at all my clippings, but because of something
life-altering that occurred to me as a result of having
written it, something about the teaching of writing that I
hope I never forget.
“The parturition of a writer, I
think, unlike that of a painter, does not display any
interesting alliances to his masters… A writer can be seen
clumsily learning to walk, to tie his necktie, to make love,
and to eat his peas off a fork. He appears much alone and
determined to instruct himself.” — John Cheever
I’ve always liked that quote by Cheever.
It had the crystal clear ring of truth when I first read it,
and now as I experience my own parturition as a writer, it
strikes a chord within me that is even more resonant. After
reading the essays in this collection you may be surprised to
learn that I greatly admire the writing of John Updike,
William Kennedy, and John Cheever, and that I have recently
discovered the joy of E. B. White for you will find no
interesting alliances to the writers I revere. It’s not that I
haven’t tried to incorporate into these essays certain
stylistic aspects of their work, I simply haven’t been
successful at rendering an Updike sentence or a Kennedy
metaphor in my own. In my brief initiation into the craft of
writing, I have stumbled many times on awkward turns of
phrase, sloppy syntax, and the dreaded passive voice. I walk
now, clumsily at best, and, as I look back upon on my
experience, I am not surprised to have arrived at this
juncture, necktie askew, virginity lost, empty fork in hand as
I turn, reluctant and embarrassed, to confront a trail of
fallen peas, ten weeks long, stretching back to the first day
of class.
When a writer chooses to express
himself in the form of the essay, he takes on a huge personal
responsibility, a burden not inherent in other literary forms.
Every essayist is his own biographer. Even when his “I” is not
his subject, he can never divorce himself completely from the
focal point of his discussion. The presence of the writer can
always be felt lurking in the events he selects or the ideas
he emphasizes, and in his use of language. His essay, even
when it is nothing more than an objective rendering of some
occurrence, amounts to several pages in the book of his life.
Every essay he creates (and this is the scary part) is, in
essence, a self-portrait. If he includes information which is
not factual, or makes a statement which is not based entirely
in truth, he not only misrepresents his subject, he
misrepresents himself. With every straining metaphor he
strains his credibility. With ever conclusion he asserts which
does not follow logically from his premises, he abuses his
reader’s trust and needlessly maligns himself.
It is for these reasons that I am
terrified by essay writing.
Never as an artist have I felt so naked
as I do now. Never in all my creative experience have I felt
so unsure of myself, so precariously perched above failure.
The ego of a young writer is a delicate thing easily bruised.
The ego of a young essayist is fragile beyond belief. By
contrast, writing fiction seems a much safer pursuit. Unlike
the essayist, the novelist or short story writer, hiding
behind intricate twists of plot and numerous characters, can,
if he wishes, conceal himself quite well. A good storyteller
exercising the control he has over his own anonymity by
hinting from time to time about where he stands in relation to
his characters and their actions can invest his work with a
wonderful richness. Such a device is unavailable to the
essayist. If every time a novelist began a new work he was
made to sign a legal document binding him to the parameters of
his fictional medium, his contract would have a built-in
anonymity clause to be invoked as often as he wished. Under
the same hypothetical constraints, the best an essayist could
do would be to attach a statement to each essay in which he
felt he did not adequately convey his meaning. This statement
would take the form of a short disclaimer, probably something
like, “Please be patient. I’m still struggling with this
idea.” Or, if an essay turned out even worse than usual:
“Please accept my apologies. I am not myself today.”
Essay writing is not for people
deficient in spirit or courage. If it is true that after the
Apocalypse the meek shall inherit the Earth, I suspect the
post-Armageddon period in World Literature will be
characterized by a conspicuous absence of essayists. As you
would expect, there have been times when telling the truth has
been an arduous and painful endeavor for me. But it is my
lying that has hurt the most. There have been brief moments
when the truth flowed painlessly from my fingertips, but all
too often as I composed at my computer, my treacherous hands
possessed an almost pathological penchant for falsity.
I have always been bothered by
introductions, particularly those introducing bodies of
literature which are not properly introductions at all, but
conclusions. All too often, an editor attempting to introduce
the work of a fine writer will organize and categorize and
summarize that writer’s work so exhaustively there is nothing
left for the reader to discover on his own. As I read through
what I have written up to this point, I am not so sure I
haven’t committed the same indiscretion. And so it seems
appropriate that while searching for the right words to finish
this “introductory” essay, I have discovered instead the irony
implicit in my effort. As a young writer, innocently
experienced, I possess neither the maturity to accurately
assess my world, nor the ability to express these assessments
in such a way that I am certain my meaning will not be
misconstrued. I speak from my heart, in all sincerity, of
essay writing — of telling the truth — and yet I am almost
positive that somewhere in this essay I have told you a lie,
or two, or ten. So, if my work bears not the mark of truth let
it at least bear the mark of my humility for I am painfully
aware of my myriad shortcomings. As you read the following
essays, remember that to each one an unwritten disclaimer is
attached, probably something like, “”Please be patient. I’m
still struggling with this idea.” Or, if an essay turned out
even worse than usual: “Please accept my apologies. I am not
myself today.”
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