I found Pearl's article to be very interesting, and many of the terms and ideas she discussed were new to me. When she began with the idea that writing is a recursive sequence, it automatically made sense to me, though I had never thought of it that way before. Pearl described the process, and included how some writers reread their work after every sentence, while others ventured back maybe every paragraph or so. I found myself to be one of the latter, as I usually skim over my writing once I'm moving on to a new idea.
Another new topic for me that Pearl analyzed was the felt sense. Eugene Glendin described this as:
"the soft underbelly of thought ... a kind of bodily awareness that . . . can be used as a tool ... a bodily awareness that . . . encompasses everything you feel and know about a given subject at a given time.... It is felt in the body, yet it has meanings. It is body and mind before they are split apart."
Pearl discussed just how much this sense is present all writings, how it creates the essence of what the writer is trying to convey, how the audience, feels, etc. She goes on to say how an in depth understanding of the felt sense would allow writers to embrace their inner thoughts even more, and creativity and uniqueness would be much easier to harness. This sense, which originates as images and ideas in the writer's head, is, as Pearl puts it, probably the most important recursive component, because it is what moves the writer to compose something meaningful.
I really enjoyed reading your interpretation on this article. I focused more on what she mentioned about the composing process but I liked your input on the "felt sense" and feel like you really understood what she meant by it. Do you feel like you have a more "in depth understanding of the felt sense" after reading this article?
ReplyDeleteLaurel this article by Pearl was interesting to me also because like you could relate as recursive writer. I could also relate to the felt sense she descibe to. what would have been interesting to know is if you are prospective writer? I found that a lot of us writers tend to let the reader influence the way we write.
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