Analysis
Shelley Reid’s Ten Ways To Think About Writing: Metaphoric Musings for College Writing Students is probably my favorite essay to have read for this class. Her rules for writing are so relatable and genuinely useful. She writes in a way that actually exemplifies in real time what she means by what she is saying. For example, one of her points is for writers to “show, don’t just tell” and instead of simply telling us what her rules for writing are, and leaving it up to our own interpretation, to get lost and misunderstand, she uses metaphors and real world examples that are not only relatable, but also extremely engaging. I was interested throughout the entire paper; I thought that was impossible! Furthermore, not only does she thoroughly explain what she thinks we should do in our writing, she also gives tangible suggestions to go about doing it. She does this by relating the more commonly known tedious set of rules for writing to “the rhetorical challenge that lies behind it”.
My Opinion
Overall, Reid’s essay has truly changed my perspective on writing, which is difficult to do because I tend to be a know-it-all and I can get very attached and overprotective of my writing. I particularly love the note she ends her essay on, that “being a good writer is always more about trying something than about following the rules”. It is refreshing to hear a teacher encourage me to experiment with my writing, especially when I have mostly just found one tried and true method and stuck with it. I normally take the exact same over-walked path to reach the end of my essays, no matter the content, but now I feel inspired to set out on a path less traveled by.
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