Do Not Come Lightly to the Page

by Jamie Patterson, Writing Specialist

One book that rests on most of the desks in the Walden Writing Center is Stephen King’s On Writing. Even though it isn’t a book about academic writing what King has to say about writing in general is better than just about any how-to guide you can find.

In this part-memoir, part-writing guide King begs of his reader “do not come lightly to the blank page.” As a writer and a writing teacher I read these words for the first time and felt what sports fans feel when their favorite team wins. I embraced these words and repeated them, probably to many of you.

Do not come lightly to the blank page.

But now I’ve changed my mind.

As a writer my number one source of writer’s block is the feeling that I need to get just the right words down the first time and the frustration that follows when the sentence just isn’t quite right squashes my writing spirit.
As a writing teacher, though, I promote the rough first draft; that it doesn’t matter what you get down on paper as long as you get something down. And oh, by the way, don’t come lightly to the blank page. I’ve just recently realized what a difficult mixed message this is to navigate.

I still remember the exercise we did in grade school where the teacher asked us all to name the most effective weapon and once guns, bombs, and the like were exhausted without the right answer she stood before us and held up a pen.

Do not come lightly to the page, indeed.

It’s time to negotiate between the need for the rough first draft and the acknowledged power of the written word. The sixth edition APA Publication Manual has a section on revision that includes the statement that “Most manuscripts need to be revised, and some manuscripts need to be revised more than once” (APA, 2009, p. 227).

Words are powerful. Your words are powerful. The work you’re doing here at Walden is powerful and meaningful to communities within and outside of our university. The end product of this work will be your thesis or dissertation. We start, though, with one word, one page at a time.

The process here at Walden focuses on slowly building to this powerful final document. A series of documents from KAMs to proposals are designed to help you embrace the rough first draft. Our services here in the Writing Center are aimed at guiding you through the revision process: a process even the APA manual took time to point out is simply part of the writer’s work.

Next time writer’s block hits remember this and maybe, just maybe, try coming lightly to the blank page.