As writers, we seem to have this innate tendency to speak about ourselves. Call it narcissism, but one thing we cannot seem to agree on is who we are and what writing is. Last week, The California Aggie columnist Koji Frahm mentioned that writing is naturally subjective, while last year, Adam suggested that writing is a form of art. Their themes differ, but both concur on one issue: writing as a discipline is difficult to define.
The reason for this fixation is that writing is protean, shapeless and abstract. Writing has no fixed purpose, except for the response and feeling it elicits in its reader. Henceforth, writing is both an art and a science, as it is open to interpretation and yet requires a fundamental set of laws to thrive.
One prominent essayist once remarked that writers become writers because they are only willing to look inside their heads. Accusingly, he believes that rather than conscientiously experiment the way scientists do or physically struggle the way sportspeople do, writers lazily prefer to dwell in the liberty of their imagination.
So, depending on the breadth they explore, writers deliberate truths, exaggerate half-truths, articulate recollections, fabricate stories or even concoct lies. Precisely because writing is a product of the imagination, a writer’s boundaries are limited only by constraints of the human mind. Unhindered, a writer’s ideas could roam free in feverish passion and unrestrained abandon, or navigate carefully in thoughtful reason.
In attempting to elucidate the clarity their subject demands, a writer confronts two choices. One is to distort order and to envelope the arbitrary. A subject, by itself, can be static. A writer, thus, has an obligation to capture its meaning and describe it in precise terms. Their job is to engage in the abstract and the unknown.
The other is to embrace order and to comprehend the chaotic randomness. This way, by following a set of conventions, writers translate real world confusion into known percepts. Both, ultimately, require us to realign the cosmic truth into a coherent thought and reconcile contradicting strands into an organized one.
And writers determine the conversational agenda. The means to create this conversation, fortunately, is plentiful. They can choose to delight, to humor, to inform, to contrast, to humiliate, to satire and to instruct. Through a monopoly of words, writers can manipulate figures of speech to great effect. To choose one word over another is to magnify a miniscule into a massive contrast, and vice-versa. Easily, the difference of a single alphabet can manifest the story with an entirely new identity.
The rhythm and unity of words, moreover, creates a pattern. Alone, words can sound detached, repetitive, aloof and prosaic. Weave it with competence, and the text becomes a statement of intent. Weave it with mastery, attention and insight, however, and words becomes married, harmonic and resonant. Previously dormant, words have now sprung from its stupor, raging as a formidable and unyielding force. In capturing the very essence of objects, words make them subjects and scripts by themselves.
Writers also encode the gravitas of issues in metaphorical symbols and hyperbolic cues. These identities add mystery, convey nuance and deliver ironies. In a cheeky impunity, they masquerade, begging the reader to solve them. Achieving that feat, often, is to validate our insecurities and to reaffirm our worth.
Moreover, the brevity of words suggests an inherent representation of lifelessness. Typically, people view alphabets as a distinct set of adjoined characters. But, similar to human beauty, the curves of a written word can be equally erotic, purposeful and attractive. It can be alive.
As elocutionists of speech and imagination, writers purport to recognize and purvey the truths and flaws of this world. That can be true. Because writing is defined not only by distinct certainty but often by shades of ambiguity, the world in which writers live in is one rich with identity, subtlety, and character. It is a world with limitless definition.
Write, write and write to ZACH HAN at zklhan@ucdavis.edu.
