CREATIVE WRITING BUILDING BLOCKS
Creative reading (PART 2)
Ian Ayris explores the relationship between reading and the writer, and how reading can help you improve your own process
Ian Ayris
In this article I want to look at how, as writers, we can get the best out of reading in order to enhance our writing.
The reading process mirroring the writing process
In his masterpiece, Walden, Henry Thoreau wrote:
‘Books must be read as deliberately and reservedly as they were written.’
When I first read Walden many years ago I took that line to mean that a book should be read slowly, literally one word at a time. And that is, perhaps, what Thoreau meant. Having now written a few books, my interpretation of this quote has, however, changed in light of what I laughingly call my writing process.
For instance, when I first read a Shakespeare play I know there are bits I don’t understand or fully appreciate the depth of, but I’m choosing for that not to matter – just as I know every word I write in a first draft is up for grabs in the editing stage. I’m just delighting in Shakespeare’s use of language knowing I am building a foundation that the next time round will provide a deeper read – similar to the subsequent editing drafts following the first draft.
Annotate
To annotate or not to annotate, that is the question . . .
For some writers, to get the most out of a book means underlining and highlighting specific elements of text on the page – yes actually on the page, jotting notes down in the margin (referred to as marginalia) – yes on the actual page, sticky arrows pointing to specific phrases, lines or words, etc. You can maybe tell how horrified I am at this practice. If reading analytically is your thing, try not to have that as your sole aim. Allow the waves to wash over you too.