Writing Sample
The Old Typewriter in the Basement by Brian Doyle (From One Long River of Song: Notes on Wonder)
Once again a student asks me how I became a writer, and this time I say, Because of the staccato staggered music of my dad’s old typewriter in the basement. Because when he really got it going you could listen to it like a song. Because after a while you could tell if he was writing a book review or a letter just from the shift and drift of the thrum of the thing. Because it sounded cheerful and businesslike and efficient and workmanlike and true. Because a bell rang when he came to the end of a line, and you could hear him roll sheets of paper in and out of the carriage, and you could imagine him carefully lining up the carbon sheet to the face sheet, and he typed with two fingers faster than anyone we knew could type with ten, and he had the professional journalist’s firm confident knowledgeable hammer-stroke with those forefingers, as if those fingers knew perfectly well what they wanted to say and were going about their business with a calm alacrity that you could listen to all day long. Because his typewriter had dozens of deft machined metal parts and they had cool names like spool and platen and ribbon. Because his typewriter was a tall old typewriter that he loved and kept using even when electric typewriters hove into view and tried to vibrate onto his desk. Because if you stared closely at the keys, as I did quite often, you could see which letters he used more than other letters. Because the typewriter was him and he was our hero and we loved him and we wanted to be like him which is why we all learned to type. Because you would daydream of writing a story on a his typewriter but you would never actually do so because using his typewriter would be like driving God’s car. Because his typewriter stood proudly in the center of his desk and there were books and magazines and dictionaries and neat stacks of paper and manila folders and newspaper clippings and rulers and erasers and pencils and pens and a jar of rubber cement and not one but two X-acto knives sharper than a falcon’s talons, and above his desk was a shelf crowded with dictionaries and catechisms and annuals and other books of all storts, many of them bristling with bookmarks and scraps of paper marking particular pages or passages of heft and verve and dash and wit. Because when he went downstairs to his desk you could be in any room upstairs even unto the attic and hear the first hesitant strokes as he began typing, and then the sprint and rattle and rollick as he hit his stride, and then an impossibly short pause between the end of one page and the start of another, a break so brief that you could not believe he could whip one sheet out and whirl another in so fast unless you saw it with your own eyes which we did sometimes peeking from the door of the study into which no child was allowed when Dad was typing for fear you would interrupt his thoughts which were no kidding Putting Food on the Table, you will not under any circumstances interrupt your father when he is in his study, if you are bleeding come upstairs and bleed, and inform me of the cause of bleeding, and if you cannot find me find your sister, and if you cannot find either of us stanch the bleeding with a hand-towel, not a bath-towel, and go next door and ask the neighbors for assistance if necessary. Because he had been typing since he was a boy, and because all the love letters he wrote to our mother when he was far away deep in the tropics in the war were meticulously typed, and the poems he sent were meticulously typed, and because he told me once that he had several times in his thirties tried to rise before dawn to type a novel, even as the house was filled with small children and he was due on the early train to his press job in the city, but he did not have the energy to invent and embroider, and he would fall asleep with his head in his arms on the typewriter, and startle awake after a while, and never finish his novels. But I have written novels, and there are times, many times, when I think that I have done so in large part because of him and his old typewriter and the sound of his cheerful efficient staccato typing in the basement. Because he is still our hero and we love him and we want to be like him more than ever. Because maybe my novels are somehow the novels he started to write and could not finish. Perhaps somehow I have finished them for him and he startles awake and grins ruefully at his old typewriter and pads upstairs to wake the kids and I am typing these last words with my forefingers and with tears sliding slowly into my beard.
Important Takeaways
Important note – For this first lesson I want to make this extra clear: reading is about the experience between the writer and reader. It’s important what you as the reader feel, not necessarily what the writer intended. We can’t always know for sure what the writer intended, but we do know for sure what the writer did and how that made us, as the reader(s), feel. The writer and the reader get to share minds for the briefest of time and what the reader adds to that experience is so important. So as you’re reading, think: “How does this make me feel? What does this make me think of?” The best way to be a good writer is to be a good reader, and the best way to be a good reader is to read like a writer.
Now, without further ado, here are some key takeaways from this wonderful writing sample by Brian Doyle –
Word Choice –
Doyle makes a couple effective decisions with word choice that give the reader a certain feeling. For me, starting the beginning of all of his sentences with “because” emphasizes how each point he makes about his father being a huge influence behind his decision to be a writer is equally valuable as an answer to the student’s original question. It is like saying it is each of these things and all of these things.
He also uses specific word choice to recreate real world sounds within the flow and rhythm of his writing. When talking about the process of typing he uses quick staccato words like “drift” and “shift” and “thrum” which replicate the short fast sound of the keys on the typewriter.
Run-on Sentences –
The run-on sentences in this piece (really if we’re being honest, the whole piece is made up of run-on sentences) do a couple things.
First, the long run-on sentences create this illusion of following the author’s train of thought more closely than usual, enhancing the nostalgia inherent to the focus of the story.
They also give us a sort of breathlessness, reminiscent of a child talking so fast about something they love that they can barely catch their breath between words. This creates a pacing and rhythm to the writing that matches the obvious adoration in the story that Doyle has for his father.
Important thing we can learn from this! It’s okay (and encouraged) to break the rules if you’re doing it for a reason. Just remember to only break writing rules if you are doing it to create some sort of effect or feeling for the reader. If you don’t know what feeling or effect the broken rule is having in the writing (or if it’s not the one you intended) it might not be the time or place to break that rule.
Writing Tip
Use the pacing of your sentences to set the mood. Need suspense? Try using a bunch of short sentences back to back. Want a more relaxing, meandering feeling? Make your sentences long and descriptive. Caution! Only use these tactics when you’re trying to set a certain mood or make the writer think of something specific. Normally you want the majority of your writing to have varied sentence lengths. Unless you’re Brian Doyle!
Exercise & Prompt
Exercise –
Pick three moods or feelings. Using a dictionary or the internet, find at least ten words for each one you picked that makes you think of that mood or feeling. It can be in the content/meaning of the word or because of how the word sounds when you say it/read it.
Example:
Untrustworthy → sinuous, oily, slick, seduction, raspy, salesman, pinstripe, pickled, languorous, ooze
Prompt –
Use the phrase “I remember” as a structure to get you to pull up memories big and small and write about them. Use nostalgia to guide you. If you get stuck, start again with the words “I remember”. Let yourself write run-on sentences, even if they aren’t grammatically correct. Don’t let yourself get in the way of letting all the thoughts, memories and feelings coming out of your mind and onto the paper or screen. When you go back to edit (or if you’re like me, while you’re writing), experiment with changing up the sentence lengths in order to create a mood or feeling that matches with the memory you’re telling.
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