On writing: part three

The final section of On Writing was pretty good! He finished it out really well and was able to keep me interested throughout the book.

I really thought it was interesting when he was talking about his book The Stand and how he reached a stumbling block one day and didn't know where to go from there, but then randomly he came up with a great idea! It shows that you can't just force inspiration and you can't just force a good idea. It has to come with time.

When he discussed the process of writing and rewriting I was a little taken back because of the amount of effort that goes into one book. It seems like it would be awful to have to write a manuscript, rewrite it, then do it again BEFORE it even gets sent to the publisher. I understand, however, that that amount of work is necessary to becoming a successful and accomplished writer like King is. I also agree with his statement that ultimately the amount of drafts is up to the writer because everyone really does have to find their own way of doing things.

The Ideal Reader part also stood out to me. I think in anything, it's important to have that one person who will support you in whatever you do, but who also isn't afraid to be brutally honest if he or she thinks it is for the best. In King's case it was his wife, but I think everyone has that one person who's opinion matters more than anyone else's.

Throughout this book, King was able to give different advice and answer questions that are really useful! I liked his point about how stories don't come from themes but instead once you write a story, you look for those points that all tie together to create a theme, and I agree with this. I think personally that writing would be more enjoyable without deciding a theme ahead of time and just finding it later on. I also thought it was interesting how he practically recommended not going to writing classes. I just assumed he would encourage it since he is such an accomplished writer, but instead he discourages it. I guess what he feels is that true talent for writing is something that writing classes can't force upon you, it is just kind of there. You can't create talent out of what isn't already there, but you can, however, improve upon the talent you already have by fine tuning and tweeking a little here and there.

I really enjoyed the last section of his book, On Living. I had no idea that King had been in that kind of accident and it was cool to know that even though he had been through all that stuff, he was able to persevere, go through many hours of physical therapy, and write again to build up to where he left off. It just goes to show that no matter what life throws at you, you can conquer it.

Overall, I really enjoyed this book, and I learned a few good tips from it, too! I'm not a Stephen King reader, but this book, and the tid bits of different stories he wrote inserted everywhere, make me want to try some of his books!

State of the Union Address

I've always respected President Obama for his speaking and his leadership. That's part of a lesson my parents have taught me over and over again: You don't have to respect the person, but you must respect the position. And while I normally don't agree with everything Mr. Obama says, in some ways I felt that he was more neutral when it came to picking sides on some issues.

He started and ended strong. That is the sign of a very good speech writer; starting with speaking for our troops and ending with the same with a little of Bin Laden thrown in at the end to get us all feeling patriotic. It seemed that there was a lot of times where he seemed to be talking to the service people of our nation such as the military, police force, firefighters, and things of the sort. Which I feel like is a great thing, they deserve the credit, but it felt like he was going down a checklist all night.

This is a re-election year. And for him to bring up things that will get everybody to agree was part of the idea. Such as bringing troops home. This is an idea that is supported by all military families that have troops overseas, no matter political party. The entire night it felt like his speech went down a checklist of what to make sure he needs to cover in order for the people to know what he is thinking on the subjects that the GOP candidates have been talking for what seems like forever now.

One thing that I think really stuck out for me is the college tuition idea. I know it stuck out because I know that's my next stage in life. I have worked my butt of doing everything I can to get into the school of my dreams with a reasonable scholarship and he implies that higher education is a right? No. You have to choose to want to go the extra mile now if you want to succeed in life. Things like this is what will put in peoples mind that when something is too hard, here comes the government to save the day. But that's enough ranting on that.

One interesting comment I think he made made me think of how our language changes. He used the actually term “gay verses straight”. Now I don't have a problem with that but I can't help but feel that a few years ago, a president would not have dared use that type of slang that is now so widely accepted.

One of the things I really agreed on him with was the idea to essentially redesign the legislative branch. Something were doing is obvously now working, and fixing all the crazy hoops anything has to jump through to make a difference is a good idea. While on thing I disagree with was his comment that our nation is not declining. We looked up the debt clock in history last week, that was not a sign of any sort of nation that is doing anything but declining.

But overall I believe he did a very good job. Avoided anything that could really offend people, went down the re-election checklist very efficiently, and made some very interesting points; now all we need is a good bit of action.

On writing, part 2

I have to say, I definitely liked the last section better than this one, but I still liked this one. He was somehow able to take a totally boring subject and make it a little bit more appealing.

First off, he started off by comparing writing to telepathy. This really makes sense to me because that's practically what it is. Through writing, he is able to convey the same thoughts and ideas and get the same points across to completely different people at completely different times. He had those thoughts in 1997, the people who read it in 2000 understood the same point, and I, in 2011, am understanding the same exact things that everyone else did. Pretty cool how that works.

One part of this section he discussed vocabulary and mentioned the words insalubrious, dithyramb, cozening, and raconteur, all of which I was absolutely clueless on the meaning. BUT  I looked them up on my iPad (built in dictionary) and I now know that an "insalubrious dithyramb" is an enthusiastic piece of writing that is unfavorable to the health, and that a "cozening raconteur" is a cheating storyteller. I will probably never use these words in my entire life, but it's cool to know what they mean.

Another section that stood out to me was when he was talking about the differences between bad, competent, good, and great writers and how you can't make a good writer into a great one. I'm not really sure why he thinks this but it could be that since a good writer is already "good" they may just be satisfied with staying there and not actually progressing, whereas a competent writer is so close to being good that they just have to push themselves that extra bit in order to reach their full potential. I know sometimes it's easy to just settle for what you have at the moment rather than to try a little harder to reach what you could be so that may be what he means by that. 

When King was talking about talent and how you do something that you're talented at until you can't physically do it any longer, it made me want to go practice trombone and spinning mace. I definitely understand what he means by that. When you're talented at something and it's something you enjoy doing, you just want to improve upon that until you can't stand it anymore.(And I have practiced solos to that point..)

The final thing that I liked about this section was King's discussion on symbolism especially his reference to Jesus in his book The Green Mile. I mostly liked this because I thought it was really clever to give his character those initials, and I probably never could have thought of that.

Overall, this section was more tolerable than I thought it would be. I honestly thought it would be awful since the whole thing was only on writing, but I actually enjoyed it and I learned a few things while reading it also!

On Writing, Blog 1

          Like anyone who you would tell to read the first one hundred pages about a book about writing, literally entitled On Writing, I was dreading buying (or downloading rather) this book. I had heard that the CV section was actually pretty funny and I know some of these movie buff guys have a really good sense of humor so I did have a better expectation than when I first bought it. The first sentence already had me cracking up, reading the words “I joined a rock-and-roll band composed mostly of writers.”, I pictured all of my past English teachers in a rock band, of course, with Mrs. Shoemake singing because that's just funny. I can relate to just about anything when it comes to music. When he mentions the sentence, “We do it for the music, but we also do it for the companionship.”, I automatically highlighted it. This sentence reminded me of sitting in those long, boring wind ensemble rehearsals coming up with inside jokes with the guy next to me is just about as fun as playing the instrument itself. After the section that talked a bit about music I then remembered I was reading a book for English, but it still had plenty more hysterical antics within the rest of the entire section. While I do understand that this is just a sort of introduction to the book I really do feel like I have learned a lot about Stephen King and I've never read any of his actual books! But now I can see with the next title page that this is when he starts talking about actual writing. This of course is to be expected because it is English class and the title is On Writing. Overall, like most people I really was surprised in his detailed memory and sense of humor. With this background information I do feel that I will enjoy the rest of the book much more than without the introduction.