ISBN: 0-86709-267-X
258 pp., List Price: $25.00		 Writing From Start To Finish

 

The lively, direct how-to book and classroom text that helps writers and students of writing on all levels.

  • Discover and develop their own voices
  • Use their background and experience
  • And bring their problem-solving resources to bear upon the challenges of writing

 

"Writing From Start To Finish sets out the clearest and most comprehensive composition theory that I'm aware of today, powerfully developing the connections among thinking, speaking, reading, writing, and listening." -Beverlye Brown, Maplewood Community College

"This is an empowering book [Writing from Start to Finish]... It's a convincing instance of the principle that the relation between speech and writing is crucial. It shows students concretely how that connection works, and can work for them."
- Richard Ohmann, Wesleyan University, Connecticut, former Editor of College English
Used successfully for many years in creative writing, composition and prose forms classes, John Schultz's Writing from Start to Finish is the only text that:
  • Offers a fully developed process of writing approach; how to get the writing started, develop and finish it;

  • Develops fully the great resource that students bring with them, i.e., the powerful relationship between speech and writing and between oral forms and written forms, including traditional rhetorical forms;

  • Addresses the needs of the broad diversity of students in the modern classroom and helps them to write better formed sentences, paragraphs, and completed stories and essays;

  • Neither talks down to students nor over their heads;

  • Presents as models effective, award-winning writings by undergraduates who come from diverse backgrounds of race, class, and speech, as well as fresh and effective models from a variety of professional authors, including appealing favorites by Jonathan Swift, Katherine Anne Porter, Herman Melville, W.E.B. DuBois, Charles Darwin, Christina Stead, Richard Wright, Franz Kafka, Robert Penn Warren, Jane Goodall, and many others;

Classroom strategies are set forth in clear sequence and detail in a well developed, Teacher’s Manual for Writing from Start to Finish. The manual is addressed directly to the teacher and deals directly with the contradiction-riddled situation that every writing teacher faces.

 

Praise from Teachers who have Adopted Writing From Start To Finish for use in Classes:

 

"Writing from Start to Finish manages what the vast array of writing texts do not, namely, to be accessible, challenging, and, above all, eminently useful for writers of all levels of development and from many different backgrounds. Direct, readable, this text blends Story Workshop theory with a multitude of specific suggestions, strategies, and exercises that respond effectively to the practical needs of creative writing as well as nonfiction prose forms classes. Particularly impressive is Schultz's focus upon drawing out and developing capacities and skills that virtually all of us possess to some degree: speaking/writing connections of voice, thinking/seeing-in-the-mind, gesture, sense for basic form, narrative movement, and point of view. In combination with classroom approaches that emphasize the dynamic use of the immediate audience, the Story Workshop approach promotes a democracy of imagination, subject matter, and voice; and Writing From Start to Finish should be a staple for teachers and writers seeking energetic, clear writing and improved critical thinking, reading, and writing skills." -Randall Albers, Chair, Fiction Writing Department, Columbia College Chicago.

 

"Writing From Start To Finish and the Story Workshop approaches… develop strong writing. This, then, becomes a strong incentive for correct usage. In fact, linking oral activities closely to the writing reduces dramatically the number of syntactical errors." - Geraldine Martin, Calumet College

 

Writing From Start to Finish-Table of Contents

Preface

I THE HOW-TO FORM

Introduction 1
From Cross-Country Skiing Today John Caldwell 4
"How to Make Lasagna" Phyllis Crowley 10
Writing Your How-To: The Subject 14
From Moby Dick Herman Melville 15
"How to Make Chitterlings" Chris Burks 18
Writing Your How-To: The Audience 21
A List of the Major Elements and Characteristics of the How-To Form 22
How to Do Something You're Not Supposed to Do 23
How-To Subjects 24
Writing Your How-To: All-at-Once 25

 

II THE PROCESS OF WRITING

Working Methods: Getting Started, Build-up, Continuing, and Rewriting 29
Process Techniques for an Essay 34
Seeing-in-the-Mind 36
Spoken Language and Written Language 45
What About the Difficulties of English Spelling? 51
Moving from Speech to Writing 52
What We Need Is a Mixed Diction 53
Punctuation 54
Voice 56
Journals and Notebooks 57
From Diaries: 1910-1913 Franz Kafka 58
"Journal Entry" Ann Hemenway 62
A Journal Activity 64
Writing in Your Journal 65
The Letter Form 67
From The Letters of Gustave Flaubert 70
"Open Letter to President Wilson" W.E.B. DuBois 73
"Dear Emily" Beverlye Brown 75
"Gus Is Dead" James 0. Elder 78
Exaggeration 80
Comparisons 82
Metaphor and Audience 83
Gesture and Metaphor 84
Other Gestural Correspondences 85
Active Verbs 85

 

III HOW-IT-HAPPENS 88

How Things Happen: Subjects and Principles; Perception and Expression of Instances and Patterns 88
"Rats" Mike Schwarz 88
From The Year of the Gorilla George Schaller 93
From The Voyage of the Beagle Charles Darwin 97
Journal Instances for "Parents, Children, and No" John Schultz 99
"Parents, Children, and No" John Schultz 101
Writing Your How-It-Happens Instances 105
Monsters 107
From "The Garlic Monster" Andrew Allegretti 108
"The Bread Monster" Shawn Shiflett 109
Telling and Writing Your Monster 110
Parodies and Satires 111
"Magical Mechanical Machine" Scott Hoeppner 112
"How Far Would You Go?" Gary Gaines 112
"Station Break" Cloteria Easterling 114
Writing Your Parody 114
Comparison and Contrast of Short Instances to Develop Patterns 115
From The Man Who Loved Children Christina Stead 117
"Elaine's and Sheila's Dreams" Ann Hemenway 119
Writing Your Comparison and Contrast of Short Instances 119
Model-Telling 120
From Lay My Burden Down B.A. Botkin 121
From Moby Dick Herman Melville 124
From All the King's Men Robert Penn Warren 126
From Close Quarters Larry Heinemann 127
"The Mating of the Mantis" J. Henri Fabre 129
Writing Your Model-Tellings 131
Model-Summary 131
From The Robber Barons Matthew Josephson 132
"Chimpanzees' Touching Behavior" Jane Goodall 132
From "Old Mortality" Katherine Anne Porter 133
Model Extended Comparisons (Analogies, Similes, Metaphors,and Figures) 135
Writing Your Model Comparison (Analogy, Simile, Metaphor, Figure) 138
Model-Character-Telling 138
From The Man Who Loved Children Christina Stead 139
"Cool Willie" Ronald Booze 141
"Route Manager" James Hall 143
Writing Your Model-Character-Telling 145

 

IV POINT-OF-VIEW 147

Point-of-View 147
From "Problems of Collecting Oral Literature" MacEdward Leach 148
From The Kandy-Kolored Tangerine-Flake Streamline Baby Tom Wolfe 149
From The Man Who Loved Children Christina Stead 149
From Einstein: The Life and Times Ronald W. Clark 152
"Wordsworth Visioning and Re-Visioning" Randall Albers 154
Using Point-of-View Structure in Your Writing 156
Opposites 157
"Morgan" John Schultz 157
From The Informed Heart Bruno Bettelheim 158
From the Introduction toNative Son Richard Wright 160
"Marge" Sharon Weber 163
Writing Your Opposites 165
Story-Within-a-Story 167
From Moby Dick Herman Melville 168
From "Jonah" 172
"Adam and Eva Mae" Reginald Carlvin 173
Writing Your Story-Within-a-Story 178
Letter on Behalf of Yourself 180
"Jack London to Messrs. N. Clark & Sons" 180
"To: Ward Heeler, 51st Ward" Andrew Hyzy 181
Writing Your Letters on Behalf of Yourself 183
Course of Reasoning in Support of a Public Issue 183
"Euthanasia" Marilyn Mannisto 183
Writing Your Side of a Debate 188
Folktale 188
"How to Melt, Blacken, and Break" Betty Shiflett 189
"The Cat and Mouse in Partnership" The Brothers Grimm 191
"A Cat and a Chick Hooked Up" Sandra L. Crockett 193
Writing Your Folktale 195

 

V HOW-IT-HAPPENS-INSTANCE COLLECTIONS AND GENERAL 196

How-It-Happens Instance-Collections 196
"How People Relate to Cancer" Marilyn Mannisto 196
From "D to the Knee! Stone to the Bone!" Dino Malcolm 203
Writing Your How-It-Happens Collection of Instances 207
General Essays-Combining Personal Observation, Research Through Reading, and Other Research Methods 208
"Oration by Chief Seattle" 208
"On the Murder of His Family" James Logan (Tah-gah-jute) 209
Definitions 209
Comparison and Contrast-Division and Classification 211
From Motion Will Be Denied John Schultz 211
From The Jungle Upton Sinclair 215
"Cairo, U.S.A. 1971" Betty Shiflett 216
"Einstein and Frankenstein" Michael Finger 223
Writing Your Essays-Content, Clustering of Instances, and Organization 226
General Essays - How-It-Happens - Research Through Reading 227
From The Art of Survival Cord Christian Troebst 228
"Workerology" Reginald Carlvin 231
Writing Your General Essay - How-It-Happens - Research Through Reading 238

 

VI HOW-TO-DO-IT-Better 242

How-to-Do-It-Better-Technical Form 242
From Moby Dick Herman Melville 242
How to Eat a Hostess Ho Ho Better Sue Ferraro 245
Writing Your How-to-Do-It-Better Technical Form 246
How-to-Do-It-Better-Parodic and Satirical Proposals 247
"A Modest Proposal" Jonathan Swift 247
"Dear Henry" Daniel Andries 252
Writing Your Parodic and Satirical How-to-Do-It-Better Proposal 257

 

 

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