The Writing Life -- Jessica Schwier

In Annie Dillard's "The Writing Life," she discusses what writers may go through in order to create great works for us to read. Writing a work is a tedious process, in which the writer goes through reading and throwing away various parts multiple times. Dillard uses a painter as another example, they are constantly tearing away one work of art in order to improve it that much more the next time. However, Dillard makes an excellent point in saying that once something is looked at too many times, it becomes correct in the writer's mind. Once they ready it over and have found so many things wrong with it previously, they can no longer find corrections to make. It sounds wonderful to them. Dillard gives the example of a photographer who, every year, returned with the same photograph of a landscape. Every year it was rejected. What the old photographer viewing his pictures did not consider is why he kept returning with this same old photograph he always put in the bad pile. What he did not realize was that the photographer climbed a mountain to take that shot and it meant much more to him than any of his other photographs. When reading works, we are overly critical of writers and their styles and word choice. We immediately discuss errors we may find or gaps in writing. We, as readers, do this without knowing how much the writer did go through in order to achieve this accomplishment. The cost the writer went through to make this writing, how long he strove to perfect it, should cross our minds. As readers, we need to understand the writing process and appreciate what the writer has undertaken to finish their work. They make personal sacrifices in trying to please us. I really enjoyed this excerpt from Dillard's work. It opened my eyes to thinking how much I go through when writing my papers. When professor's make corrections I easily could have caught, it upsets me that I did not catch it first. However, editing and re-editing a paper so much can mess you up in that regard. This few pages by Annie Dillard allows people to look at writing as a work of art that should be appreciated, not criticized. It allows the reader to see from the writer's perspective and really learn to understand what the writer may have gone through.