Monday 06 May 2024
I just finished grading my students’ Paper Two Assignment, the War Class’s significant researched-argumentative essay. All that now awaits me is the Final Exam, which is scheduled late during the Finals calendar, and so I must wait—not only for the Final to be over but to begin the Revision of my Katyn manuscript. In this brief lull, I am planning how to administer and execute the Revision of the Katyn manuscript. Additionally, I am contemplating how to continue writing for the blog.
The anticipated writing program came to me, as so many ideas do, during my dog walk with Laska. What I thought of was: to start a new blog series, entitled: The Revision Diaries. I imagine for each Monday blog—my dedicated, scheduled release for my blogs—I would jot down observations from each day’s writing session for the week. For example, The Revision Diaries: Week One could look something like the following:
MONDAY XX JUNE 2024
I started work on the Afterward. I am relieved that I have been regularly writing for this blogsite because much of the Afterward derived from early blog drafts, which I determined were better suited for the Katyn manuscript….
TUESDAY XX JUNE 2024
I struggled with the sub-chapter entitled “__.” Why am I having trouble with this part of the revision…..
This conceptual format for The Revision Diaries should give me the flexibility and occasion to blog but also secure me the concentration and hours to revise the manuscript.
I don’t want to take a hiatus from writing for the blog because writing for it has proven to be so rewarding. Blogging has strengthened my writer’s confidence. Doing so has inspired me to continue writing, even while the manuscript hibernated during my semester’s teaching responsibilities. For most of my writing process for the Katyn manuscript, I had entrapped myself in deep and LENGTHY writer’s block. Rediscovering my creative energy was a hard-won victory, one that I am fiercely determined to protect. Therefore, I will write and publish my blogs weekly. This insistence has become my mantra. Even the smallest and purposely modest blog entry for The Revision Diaries will be affirming that allegiance to produce weekly blog publications. These expected blogs on revision will also serve as constant reminders to revise; The Revision Diaries will hold me accountable to the revision process, thereby sharing with you, Reader, an insider’s perspective into how the manuscript will develop into its penultimate final form.
When I started this blog page, I told myself my blogs mustn’t be long pieces—no more than 5-or 6-hundred words. Ha! That self-imposed restriction was quickly and easily removed by my creative unconscious. By subtitling my blog page, “My Writer’s Notebook,” I genuinely feel like the blogs I write do represent a notebook, a space to write. Writing for this blog allows me to experiment with phrasing, word choice, and themes. And to be able to reflect upon the revision, in real time, in short blogs, could unlock new writing choices.
Reflecting upon revision work is a writing student exercise from my Writing courses. In fact, with each major writing assignment (there are three essays my students write during a semester), I require my writing students to write an in-class essay I call “Reflection.” Three papers mean three reflections; moreover, the Final exam for my Writing classes is a Reflection. I believe that students improve their analytical and academic writing if they study their own writing process. Questions I ask them to choose for their first assignment Reflection are: “What was the hardest or easiest part of the paper for you to write;” or, “If you had an additional week to finish this paper, what would you do with the extra time.” The question for their second assignment Reflection is: “We are at the midpoint of the semester. You are not the same writer you were at the start of the semester. What new strengths or weaknesses have you discovered in your writing process?” And the question for their third assignment Reflection is: “What writing advice would you give to a student taking this course next semester?” These reflection prompts aren’t unique; they are common ones that many writers benefit from exploring.
In part, my proposed The Revision Diaries may attempt to answer those above-mentioned prompts, to solve any writing challenges, and to celebrate those achievements. Honestly, I can’t say for sure how I will write the upcoming The Revision Diaries blog series. When I started this blog enterprise, I didn’t know what I would write. Sometimes I planned to write about X and ended up writing about 7. At the very least, The Revision Diaries should be, I hope, a curious and exciting phase of the eventual Katyn book.