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Aryan Patel

Lauren kalstad

Engl 1310.002

04/14/2020

Argument Analysis on “Shitty First Drafts” by Anne Lamott

​Most writers don’t have time for writing multiple drafts with the thought that they will get it right in

the first draft. Although few writers get it right for the first time, there is the pressure of the

modern academy that makes writers believe that time is limited to work on multiple drafts. In

their goal to be more accurate, writers are mostly not concerned about the use of the first draft

because they believe that revisions must be there. Writers see writing words on the page and

later move them around as a failure. The idea of a shitty first draft practically talks about good

news than that of a short assignment. All good writers use the concept of a shitty first draft to

come up with the last two drafts.

Individuals view great writers with good financial progress and whose books have been

published in book studios as if they don’t sit down on their desks, think about themselves, what

drives them and what they want to tell people in writing (Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, 2018). The

fact is these successful writers sit down on their desks, take a deep breath, roll their necks

severally to obtain the information out, and start typing their fully compressed passages faster

than court reporters. According to Kjeldgaard-Christiansen (2018), most great writers whose

books are loved have made a great amount of money, they don’t start their drafts with

confidence, and most of them are favoured by their visions. Their first drafts are not standard.

Most writers do not know what they are doing until they have achieved it, and also, they

don’t do it excitedly. Only a few are aware of what they are writing. Writers type a few words and

then get themselves constrained along as huskies across the snow. Most writers do it not

because they don’t have other choices but because they are capable, and that’s why they sit

down every morning and type something (Duarte, 2019). All the writers feel like giving up even

those who produce the most natural and fluid prose. According to Anne Lamott, most sentences

and words do not come easily or flow out like ticker tape many times (Duarte, 2019). Most

writers see their work very aggressive, hostile and compare writing as taking dictation from God

every morning.

For most writers, writing is not easy and does not lead to happiness. The only way writers

can achieve anything is by first writing a shitty first draft (Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, 2018). Child’s

draft is the first draft, where the writer pours out all the words and lets them roughly all over the

place bearing in mind that nobody will see it and that the writer will shape it afterwards. The

writer channels the childlike parts together to whatever voices for visions to come true through a

page. All characters are allowed to say whatever they want to say in the writing because no one

will be able to see the first draft (Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, 2018). The writer just puts everything

on a book because the six crazy pieces or pages must contain strong statements the writer may

have obtained from a grown-up or rational means. There may be some good statements in the

very last paragraph of page five that the writer loves, and see it very beautiful as it links him or

her to the topic (Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, 2018). There was no way the writer could have

obtained the statement without getting through the first six pages of the draft.

There was a writer who used to write California magazine’s food reviews before it folded.

The reviews took not less than two days to write because first, the writer had to go to the

restaurant several with few appointed close friends in tow (Duarte, 2019). The writer has to sit

down and write all the interesting or funny things people said while in a restaurant. Then, the

writer could sit down on Monday on his desk with the collected notes to write the review (Duarte,

2019). The writer could panic at times, even having done the reviews for years. The panic

resulted when the writer had to try to write a lead but instead do various dreadful sentences, try

everything out, and then become worried and feel despaired by the reviews as an x-ray apron

(Duarte, 2019). The writer becomes ruined by writing up to the point of going back to the

previous job as a clerk-typist (Duarte, 2019). Eventually, he had to sit on his seat and put down

a shitty first draft to serve as the first paragraph bearing it will not be seen by anybody.

The writer could begin writing by making figures move through typing, and writing would

be terrible. The writer would start by writing a whole page paragraph, although the entire

paragraph need was at most three pages long. According to Kjeldgaard-Christiansen (2018),

writings could involve descriptions of food and bird by bird criticizing writers’ shoulders behaving

like cartoon characters. The cartoon characters will be rolling their eyes at writer’s overwritten

descriptions of food regardless of how he attempted to distinguish the characteristics or

irrespective of how careful he was about what friends told him in days of restaurant reviewing

(Kjeldgaard-Christiansen 2018). But because the writer has been in the field for long, he could

trust the process and sort of the review.

The writer had to come up with the first draft twice with a boring beginning, putting down

characteristics of food and what friends told him (Duarte, 2019). The next day the writer could

go through all the drafts with a coloured pen finding words for the second paragraph, and

figuring out kind words to finish the paragraph with and then come up with draft two. The second

draft comes out fine though funny and helpful (Duarte, 2019). The writer could go through it

several times and then mail it. Then when it’s time for another review, which occurs after a

month, the same process starts again.

All good writers start with unpleasant first efforts because they all need to start

somewhere (Brown, 2016). The writers begin by writing anything or something down on paper

like a sentence or a paragraph like they always say, the first draft is a downdraft because they

just get it down (Brown, 2016). The second draft is somehow quality because it's fixed up and

said to be updated (Brown, 2016). The third draft is more accurate because the writer puts the

idea more accurately and checks everything to see if it is up to the standards.

Conclusively, writing requires patience meaning that writers are committed to their work.

Most writers trust their instincts and have to go against what they have been told because the

perception people have towards writers is unique from their real work. The first draft is termed

as the child’s draft, where writers put their thoughts anyhow, bearing in mind that it can’t be

seen before they edit it. The writers use these childlike words to be part of their work for their

voices and visions to come true through writing. Hence, every paper that writers have to write,

they always come up with the first draft. Then see what they are thinking about on the paper

and fix it up how they like it.

Sources:

Kjeldgaard-Christiansen, J. (2018). Studying English at Aarhus University. Leviathan:

Interdisciplinary Journal in English.

https://doi.org/10.7146/lev.v0i3.108058

Duarte, Fernanda Lima (2019) "My Theory of Writing," WRIT: Journal of First-Year

Writing: Vol. 2 : Iss. 2 , Article 1.

https://scholarworks.bgsu.edu/writ/vol2/iss2/1

Brown, B. (2016). Brené Brown encourages educators to normalize the discomfort of learning

and reframe failure as learning.

https://doi.org/10.1002%2Fabc.21224