The Power of Revision (Michelle Intro) (09/18/2021)

The Power of Revision | The Weekly Atticus

A recap of the week's writing at Atticus Review. Intro by Michelle Ross.

A couple weeks ago, on a Monday night after dinner and after watching an hour or so of television, my son said, “Would you read the essay I wrote for school? I need help writing a conclusion.” The essay was about the asteroid Bennu. My son had been telling me about Bennu for several days. He’d seemed curious and enthusiastic about his chosen subject.The essay I read there at the kitchen table that evening, however, did not exude the same curiosity and enthusiasm. It was a haphazard collage of random facts relayed in a dry manner. Some probing revealed that he’d drafted this thing while I was cooking dinner that night, spending all of maybe thirty minutes on it. When I asked when the essay was due, he gave me a sheepish grin. “Tuesday,” he said. “Tuesday as in tomorrow?” I said. Yep, that Tuesday. With little time to spare, we quickly got to work. I noticed he'd included information that seemed important but he hadn't explained why. Also, he seemed to really enjoy the engaging voice of one of his sources, so I encouraged him to find what he liked about it. Maybe try to adopt a similar voice. Have fun with the writing.As we worked together on revising his essay, I noticed that he seemed to enjoy making these various improvements. I detected hints of both pleasure and pride. It’s hard work and it’s scary reckoning with the inadequacy of our words, but in doing so, there is freedom and power, and I think he felt a little of that. While my son’s procrastination (and the procrastination of so many student writers, both young and old) is certainly not the fault of schools, I do wonder if it speaks to the challenge of teaching writing in schools—or, more precisely, revision, which any writer worth their salt knows is writing. There’s rarely, if ever, adequate time in school to realistically model how people who devote their lives to revising their words do this thing called revision. In the case of this Bennu essay, my son turned in his rough draft on Tuesday, received feedback from his teacher on Thursday, and had to submit his final draft on Friday. Of course, then the essay was cast aside, most likely never to be revisited again. Rare is the course in which a student takes a piece of writing through many drafts over a period of months, much less years, yet months and years is quite often how long writers in the real world revise.A writer friend from my MFA years, Kiese Laymon, bought back the rights to his first two books, Long Division and How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America, in part so that he could revise and republish them anew. In an interview with Peter Ho Davies through The Center for Fiction a few months ago, Kiese said he was already revising his memoir, Heavy, and that, in fact, when he gives readings, he reads the revised words, not what’s printed on the page of the book itself. In another interview, Kiese said, “I’m never going to stop revising Heavy no matter what…The book is published but the book is not done.” Kiese is on the extreme end of the revision spectrum. I suspect I don’t have quite the same level of devotion that he does, but I admire his devotion to the revision process in writing and in living, and I think it has much to teach the rest of us. While certainly it’s possible to overwork a piece, anyone who reads literary journal submissions knows that more writers are at risk of not revising enough than of revising too much. As for my eleven-year-old son, I count myself lucky that he even asks me to read his writing and give him feedback. I don’t expect to convince him in one night of the power of revision—that it is absolutely worth starting an essay earlier so that he has time to live with his sentences and reconsider them, dismantle and rebuild them; that it takes courage to reckon with the inadequacy of our words and try to do better; that what we say and how we say it matters. But I hope that bit by bit he develops an appreciation for what revision can do—how the introspective work of revision can transform his writing and his life. Thanks for reading. We're glad you're here.Michelle RossFiction Editor

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THIS WEEK AT ATTICUS

FICTIONWHOLESOME FAMILY FUNby Tanya Žilinskas"...it’s nobody’s birthday, there’s no party. But we kids know it could be anybody’s birthday today. It could be your birthday, I whisper to Benny. It could be mine."READ ON

POETRYWHAT SHE LEFT BEHINDby Alexis Rotella"I never met my unmarried aunt, Theodora, one of the great tango dancers of Buenos Aires as well as a socialite who threw parties for artists of all persuasions."READ ON

CREATIVE NONFICTIONCRYSTAL COVEby Kareem Tayyar"When we arrive there are six seagulls standing at the shore, discussing amongst themselves whether they should fly to Catalina for the night."READ ON

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