There are a lot of Laura Ojedas in the world, too, and most of them are Latino. I think it'd be fun to write them letters and hear their life stories, because to me that was the most interesting part about Brian Doyle's essay. I like how, towards the beginning, he says "one of us is nearly finished with his doctorate in theology; one of us is a nine-year-old girl"--I definitely did not expect that, and it made me laugh out loud! Doyle then goes on to record all the little anecdotes sent to him by the other Brian Doyles, and how they told this Brian Doyle their hobbies, their family histories (I love family histories!), etc. Each little story told us what that particular Brian Doyle was like.
I appreciated how Doyle used an obituary notice to show the differences between personal writing and very objective writing. Obituaries are so much more interesting when we know about the person's personality, not about his life achievements. I've always thought graveyards were incredibly scary but also intriguing, because I wanted to know the stories behind the people whose names were on the gravestones. I love old photos, I love learning about my own ancestry, and I love hearing other peoples', so I really enjoyed this piece's appreciation for these things.
I don't know if we were supposed to comment on Brian's 'afterword' sort of thing, but I will anyway: I thought his writing tips were okay, but I think they missed something huge: READ! You have to read in order to know how to write! It's important nowadays to be able to type quickly, but one can also write by hand. It's important to write every day, but I think it's more important to read every day, to "read like a wolf eats" (in Gary Paulsen's words). I've seen wolves eat. They eat all day long, the same carcass. I saw this at Yellowstone in January. We saw the wolves in the morning; and when we left the park in the evening, we saw them still eating that same poor dead elk.
Regardless of my problems with the writing tips, I love the care this piece has for personalities and histories, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.
--Laura Strawn Ojeda
I wasn't sure how I would feel about reading stranger's personal histories, but I enjoyed it too. When he included the obituary I noticed that it may have been a lot different than the man would have written had he been alive. Though he may not have said all the things our auhor suggested, he would have written his life's information differently than the obituary. That's actually a fascinating experiment--what you would write about yourself versus how others see you and what they remember and would write about to try to sum up your life.
ReplyDeleteI agree reading is important, but I really liked his listening rule--that was a new one for me.
-Katie Huffman