Taking Ownership of One’s Voice.

Voice. This word is more than a simple term. Instead, voice is a realization of the uniqueness of each individual’s ability to write. In this week’s readings, Peter Elbow talks about the writing process and his issues with the standard way in which writing is taught. After reading this week’s chapters, I felt that Elbow was challenging his readers to claim ownership of their distinctive inner (writer’s) voice and that we need to grow in our acceptance of this ownership. Otherwise, he fears that we will lose our voice, our identity and be continually uncomfortable with writing. In this blog, I will try to explore this point.

In the first chapter, Elbow talks about the importance of free writing and its positive effects on all writers. He worries that students and adults have been well trained to constantly stop themselves from writing because they are too worried about making errors. Elbow believes that this fear (or even anxiety) of writing exists
“because schooling makes us obsessed with the ‘mistakes’ we make in writing. Many people are constantly thinking about spelling and grammar as they try to write. I am always thinking about the awkwardness, wordiness, and general mushiness of my natural verbal product… We also edit unacceptable thoughts and feelings” (5).
This quote caught my attention because he is not merely focused on mechanical errors. Elbow is stating that the writer has also allowed someone or one school system’s writing curriculum to devalue his or her opinions, the writer’s voice. He worries that writers have for too long neglected their voice and he reminds his readers that “In your natural way of producing words there is a sound, a texture, a rhythm- a voice- which is the main source of power in your writing” (6). Elbow wants the writer to realize that if he or she is having problems with writing, it is not because they are a poor grammar student, writer or indifferent person but that the writer is denying or not claiming ownership of their voice. He also states that
“Maybe you don’t like your voice; maybe people have made fun of it. But it’s the only voice you’ve got. It’s your only source of power. You better get back into it, no matter what you think of it. If you keep writing in it, it may change into something you like better. But if you abandon it, you’ll likely never have a voice and never be heard” (7).
Elbow wants his readers to claim ownership of their voice and he feels that freewriting exercises will enable and empower their voice.

In the second chapter, he builds upon his belief that every writer has a “natural way” of writing and argues that a writer must relinquish a foreign writing plan if she or he wishes to release their inner voice (6). Elbow writes that writers should “Think of writing then as a way to transmit a message but as a way to grow and cook a message… Writing is, in fact, a transaction with words whereby you free yourself from what you presently think, feel, and perceive” (15). In this statement, he is declaring that we must allow writing to just occur naturally and not allow our outer perceptions, fears or anxieties to interfere with our inner voice. Thus, we write so that we can allow ourselves to seek out all the dimensions of our voice. Elbow states that people believe one is “grown” after “he has a new idea, feeling, or perception he didn’t have before” (46). However, this thought is flawed because Elbow deems that “the new element was already in waiting” just waiting for the writer to acknowledge and claim that part of his or her voice (46). He also writes that “I can now see that a lot of my stuck situations in writing come from trying to write something that I won’t be able to write for another ten years: trying to avoid the voice and self I now have” (47). Elbow believes that if a writer wants to become the exact writer that he or she has always desired to be, the writer must fully embrace his or her voice.

I look forward to discussing this text with you all on Thursday. I really am enjoying reading the first two chapters of this book and feel that there are many golden nuggets of information in both chapters. There are several other quotes and points that I would like to discuss but I will wait to converse about these items till Thursday’s class.