LITR 3731: Creative Writing
Sample Final Exam 2005
Micah Goff
I always have a hard time deciding how much I’ve learned in any class over the course of a semester. I guess this is because the only way to really evaluate the usefulness of a class is to move forward, leaving the lessons learned behind, only to see how much of the information follows and is recalled in years to come. I feel that I’ve learned quite a bit over the semester that will be useful as far as my writing is concerned, hopefully, this feeling is a good indicator of the information I will retain.
I’ll be the first to admit that I’m not the greatest student in the world. I rarely take notes and often during class time my mind wanders to one of the many auxiliary worlds that exists within my imagination. For me, learning is a lot like a connect-the-dots puzzle given to elementary students. I have a tendency to intensely focus on a point here or there until I am left with a picture that links all the information together. During this essay, it is my aim to catalogue some of these points and decipher what the picture means.
In his book, Three Genres, Stephen Minot provides many points that deserve careful consideration and that are significant to me in relation to my learning experience for the course. One such point concerns the revision process as it relates to poetry and is found in Chapter 10. Minot suggests the importance of maintaining an honest tone. One way to do this is to ask, “Is this what I really feel? Does the poem, for example, merely echo conventional sentiments, or does it honestly explore the complexity of what you feel?” (136) A simple examination of this statement leads me to believe that a good writer must know himself, or at the very least, he must make a sincere effort to probe the complex nature of the self. There is a line from a song that I’m reminded of by Willie Nelson called Shotgun Willie that says, “You can’t make a record if you aint got nothin’ to say”, well, I believe that you can’t write a poem if you have nothing to say. Unfortunately, there were days when I really had nothing to say, no inspiration, no desire to write or create. I understand that this is a necessary evil that makes the creative process more enjoyable, but these days were marked by a general awkwardness and uncertainty that left me wondering if I would be able to write at all. I wrote a poem during this semester that I did not include in my portfolio. It was short and simple, however, it was comprised of the most honest words I’ve probably ever written. The poem achieved the effect I desired, it brought a smile to the face of the person it was written for. The poem:
Sweetness of life,
My beautiful wife,
I can honestly say,
I love you more everyday.
That’s poetry to me because it captures something special, something that I really feel and live. And while those words may be insignificant to others, they are something tangible that I created, something that my wife can carry with her. I think that I read somewhere that Emily Dickinson said that if she felt physically as if the top of her head were being taken off, she knew a work to be poetry. Poetry of that nature rarely comes from falsity and can only be born from truthfulness. It is this honesty that Minot suggests is paramount to developing a desirable tone.
Another important point raised by Minot was the necessity of support groups for the development of writers. Minot suggests that writers “need people who know what you are trying to do and will react in helpful ways.” (143) In some ways I agree with Minot. I can certainly see the usefulness of people working together and spurring each other on. However, over the course of the semester I found myself a little disillusioned with workshop format. I know that at times, I might have seemed withdrawn from classroom discussion or a bit standoffish (if that is even a word) but sometimes I was a bit confused concerning the value of the peer feedback that was offered. I say this because I genuinely desired criticism of my work, I wanted to put my writing in the crucible and remove the dross. Instead, I felt that much of the peer response was often predictable, timid even, and I’m left to wonder if what role I played in the proliferation of such responses. Mostly, I just tried to listen to the voices of my classmates and be affirming when needed, critical when solicited, and silent when it seemed to suit the situation.
I feel like the last portion of the essay may have come across as a bit negative and that was not my intention. For some reason, I’m drawn to a memory from the past that seems to be relevant. At football practice in high school the linemen would push a sled from one end of the practice field to another. Five men would line up and attack the sled, driving it as fast as they possibly could. However, difficulty arose when one of the five linemen was not pushing as hard as the others; the sled would go around and around in circles until finally, everyone was exhausted except the one person who didn’t push as hard as everyone else. Inevitably, tempers would flare and frustration would rise until some Darwinian resolution came to pass, usually in the form of adolescent cruelty. What I’m trying to say is that within the workshop dynamic, there sometimes exists a place of great difficulty that resembles the sled on the football field. At times, in class, I felt like the dead weight that forced the sled in circles, at other times, I simply observed as others took on this role. I wish Minot would have included more in his text concerning the dynamics of support groups and constructive ways to maintain the aim of the group, which should be writers becoming progressively better as a result of their involvement with each other.
Another point brought to the forefront of my mind by Minot was of a more technical nature. Minot writes of plot, “What one aims for is a sequence of events that are fresh and provide new insights. The determining factor is not how many twists and turns the plot may take but how much it reveals about the characters and the theme of the story.” (149) In hindsight, I wish that I had given more credence to this during the formation of my fiction submission. In good fiction, it is necessary to reveal the inner-workings of the characters and while I feel that I succeeded in some respects, I feel that I could have done much more with the scenes submitted. While I am not emotionally tied to the submission, I do feel that writing is pointless if not an endeavor to create the very best writing that is within us to create. While I would argue that the developments surrounding the characters in the fiction scene do speak to the theme of the larger work that I have in mind, I do understand that the limited scope of the fiction scene may bring about a bit of apprehension from the reader.
Minot also included a portion called the seven deadly sins of fiction. He catalogued these sins as the high-tech melodrama, the adolescent tragedy, melodrama, the twilight zone rerun, vampires resurrected, the baby-boomer gone wrong, the temptations of Ernest Goodwriter, and my weird dream. (156-159) After reading about these sins I immediately wanted to craft a story that included them all, just to see if it was possible to break the rules and still be left with a viable story. However, after further investigation of these ‘sins’ I decided that I would best be served by pursuing my own interests and saving the frustration that was sure to arise from such a laborious effort for a piece that I actually cared about.
It seems fitting to close with an evaluation of my progress as a writer over the course of the semester. I read somewhere that talent is doing something easily that is difficult to others. By that standard I humbly believe that I possess a talent for writing. I say this because words come easily when I am focused on a particular piece. I don’t really struggle with creating or capturing an idea; however, the struggle that I often find myself confronting is much more difficult to overcome. I struggle with creating pieces that I consider mediocre. I don’t want to write pieces that have little meaning. And I do not wish to craft pieces that will be of little consequence in the grand scheme of things. I struggle with the idea that writing for me will always be a hobby, that I will be able to create pieces that are of interest to those outside of the literary world, to casual readers or in your words, “dullards”. This just isn’t good enough for me, when I write, sometimes I feel like I’m on the cusp of something that I’m unable to grasp. I become frustrated by potential unrealized, by dwelling in a realm somewhere beyond my niche. I would like to be able to make some sort of meaningful contribution with writing that goes beyond myself. I don’t know if the class helped me to move toward this point, if these thoughts are a natural progression, or if they are just a random overflow of thought. What I do know is that I’ve never written these things before or verbalized this desire. I do feel that the class has helped me develop as a writer, that I am a better writer as a result of the time spent in the class and that I will be able to improve with time and dedication. In the future, I would like to see my writing become something more than a hobby or an act of catharsis and I firmly believe that these desires will become a reality as long as I remain willing to work for a resolution.