Part 1:
While reading Lamott’s “Shitty First Drafts”, I noticed a similarity between my first draft and the one Lamott described, except there is a huge difference. The embarrassing, terrible, “child’s draft” that no one is supposed to ever see is seen by a few of my lucky peers. This creates a rather large difference because I can’t just dump out my messy thoughts on paper. I have to think clearly and try to write a good piece because I know my peers will see it and it will be almost impossible for them not to laugh or cringe. I do agree that the “child’s draft” does help. If I’m being honest, you never know where your essay will take you until you begin to write. So you could just begin writing and put down all of your thoughts, then you can go back and reconstruct them, and it really does help to do that.
Part 2:
My goal for revising my essay is for one, make my argument more clear. The three people that read my essay said that my argument was not clear enough and I need to fix it up a little. To fix this, I am going to re-read my main points and write a sentence in the introduction that reflects these points. I also noticed that my peers had trouble sometimes interpreting what I was writing and I needed to provide additional explanation. It is really hard for me to know what needs more explaining and what doesn’t because if it makes sense to me, I automatically assume that it will make sense to everyone else. I think that in order to fix this, I will need to have someone read me my whole essay. If there are times where I question what I wrote, I am going to put a star on my paper, then go back and fix it. It is really important to me that my readers understand what I am writing, and what it means to me. The last thing I need to fix is relating too much to the text and quotes. Throughout this essay, I used “I agree” and “I” a lot, so I think that if I take those out and readjust it, my argument will appear stronger because it will be less personalized. I think that this is going to be my biggest challenge because I am going to have to completely change the wording of my sentences. I thought by saying, “I agree” allows me to be more present in the conversation, but to readers, it may be irritating. If a challenge comes up that is too large for me to digest on my own, I will first ask my peers. I will ask them the question that I had, then see what they say and we will discuss it together. If they still can’t help me, I will use the Little Seagull book because there is so much information in that little book. If that still does not solve the problem, I will talk to Professor Emerson to get the professional advice.
