More surprises. I like Murray, and I thought I'd already seen everything written about him. Till I did a Google keyword search, looking for an article I'd used before but misplaced somewhere. Turned out I never found it, but ...
When I searched keywords on "Donald Murray" and "surprise," this quote popped out of the directory. It was in Murray's obituary in The Boston Globe, which noted "with characteristic frankness," he described his childhood as unhappy:
"My parents and teachers got together and decided I was stupid," he wrote last year. "My response was to develop a private mantra: 'I'm stupid but I can come in early and stay late.' Surprise. It worked. Good work habits will beat talent every time."Words to live by. Surprise the SOBs.
a blog post titled "Donald Murray was / is my hero!" by Deb Renner Smith, a Michigan literacy consultant. She says, "Don Murray is incredible. He says that he wrote, 'I write and I find myself saying what I do not expect, in a way I haven't quite said it before. I am energized by surprise.' Over and over he says that 'surprise' is the key to his writing."
And Smith linked to the text of a Murray's Keynote Address to the National Writers' Workshop in 1995 at Hartford, Conn.
I'd never seen it before.
Some nuggets (I've been thinking about nuggets, too, lately) follow:
If you are confident of your craft and are writing without terror and failure, I hope you will learn how to escape your craft and write so badly you will surprise yourself with what you say and how you are saying it.Along the way, Murray spoke of grief, of the death of his 20-year-old-daughter and his elderly father (whom he imagined being buried with a telephone in his coffin and later wrote a poem about it), of his days as a cub reporter at The Boston Herald, of aging, of his wife, of combat in World War II, of writing poetry, freelance stories for top commercial markets, scribbled notes on 3-by-5 cards and columns for The Boston Globe.* * * After I leave my writing desk, I lead a double life. I am a mole, living an ordinary life of errands, chores, conversations friends, reading, watching TV, eating and - at the same time - I am a spy to my life, maintaining an alertness to the commonplace, the ordinary, the routine where the really important stories appear.
I am never bored. I overhear what is said and not said, delight in irony and contradiction, relish answers without questions and questions without answers, take note of what is and what should be, what was and what may be. I imagine, speculate, make believe, remember, reflect. I am always traitor to the predictable, always welcoming to the unexpected.
This paying attention is not always comfortable. Reporting on the self can bring terror as well as celebration, pain as well as pleasure.* * * I write easily, and that is no accident. I remind myself that John Jerome said "Perfect is the enemy of good" and follow William Stafford's advice that "one should lower his standards." I write fast to outrace the censor and cause the instructive failures that are essential to effective writing.
I write for surprise. I start a column with a line or an image, an island at the edge of the horizon that has not been mapped. And I do not finish the columns unless I write what I do not expect to write forty to sixty percent of the way through. My drafts tell me what I have to say.* * * I was stupid stubborn. In one prize fight I was knocked down 13 times and won.
I believed - and still believe - it is my job to educate editors - by example. I propose new ways of writing old stories by showing them a draft or at least a lede. When they didn't listen I wrote it their way - and when possible wrote it my way and submitted it somewhere else.
I was and am, a cross-writer, exploring the possibilities of fiction and poetry, books and articles, columns and textbooks. Each genre illuminates the other.
I realize I had energy - and still do. My energy comes from the writing. I write and I find myself saying what I do not expect, in a way I haven't quite said it before. I am energized by surprise.
By now you're probably sick of hearing me go on and on about Don Murray. But if you read his talk to the National Writers' Conference, I think you'll be surprised. Pleasantly surprised.
Murray is also cited regularly by academic writing teachers. In fact, that's where I first came across him, when I was trying to make sense of freshman English composition as a new adjunct instructor at SCI after 15 years of newspapering. Most recently in January, Bruce Ballenger, an English prof at Boise State, wrote "Reconsiderations: Donald Murray and the Pedagogy of Surprise" by in College English (Volume 70, No. 3). Ballinger's abstract says, "Toward the end of his life, Donald Murray felt that his approach to writing instruction was no longer appreciated by journals in his field. Nevertheless, his emphasis on encouraging students to surprise themselves through informal writing still has considerable value." An earlier article in English Journal (the first page of which is avaliable on the JSTOR website) notes that "Murray valued surprise" where traditionalists value form.
http://www.ncte.org/pubs/journals/ce/articles/128778.htm
http://www.jstor.org/pss/822100
Tom Romano "The Living Legacy of Donald Murray." The English Journal, 89.3 (Jan., 2000): 74-79. Published by: National Council of Teachers of English
No comments:
Post a Comment