Sitting in Church today, listening to
the pastor speak passionately from the Scriptures, I read to myself
the words that the Apostle Paul penned in this letter to the
christian church in the Greek city of Corinth. I read his words and
in light of them, thought about my own. If I could write with the
same passion. The same unwavering commitment to the message
delivered. Paul didn't use a lot of high minded ideas and literary
flourishes to awe his readers, he just wrote from the inner most
parts of his soul. Out of his very being. I think that sometimes,
through no real fault of my own, life can bog down my writing like an
ox cart in the mire. External cares and worries, like getting a good
grade, or writing just to please the teacher (no offense Mr. Goldfine
or any other teachers of mine that might happen upon this post).
There is a message within every work. I have to find it and commit
myself to it. Then I can write from the heart and not the head.
Thanks Paul.
Paul had his problems (couldn't get along with James and Peter), but he was quite the word-spinner, and you could certainly do worse than emulate him. And in my opinion, nothing now or ever will be superior to the KJV translation.
ReplyDeleteI don't take offense at the notion that you'd write to please the teacher, but I've designed the course to minimize the temptation. I don't grade pieces; I comment and occasionally might ask for rewrites, but I'd consider it professional malpractice if I tried to create a class of mini-me's. That isn't to say I don't have standards and opinions, because I do--but my job is to go to where you are as a writer and work with you there.