The latter half of the book was a great improvement in my mind. I loved the themes of brevity, contradiction, and the human condition. It's true (not just of lyric essays, fiction, or non fiction--but of all good writing) that writing deals with the human condition and that, even in autobiography, every person can relate in some way to the characters or themes being explored within a work. In this latter half of the book, Shields seemed less like he was trying to argue something and more that he was exploring a concept. The first half felt like Shields was trying to decide whether fiction or nonfiction was better and which had more merits. Finally, the book settles down and simply explored the art of writing and creating. Which I liked SO MUCH more. It shouldn't matter what form of writing the book/paper/pamphlet/video/picture comes in--what's the concept behind it? What emotions does it engage?
The collage section was helpful to me in understanding how to go about this class more. I liked 324 and 339: "The absence of plot leaves the reader room to think about other things" and "Collage is pieces of other things. Their edges don't meet."
I think these two sections really emphasize the idea of thinking associatively when forming a collage. If a rabbit makes you think of a hat or Costa Rica or carrots, it doesn't matter if the connection is easily seen. Odds are, someone out there thinks the same things when they hear rabbit. The "reader" doesn't need to see the connections, or the edges, because without these there is a better absence of plot, which gives room for more thinking and various interpretations, which, we decided earlier in this class, is a great thing to aim for with our collages: no set meaning, multiple interpretations.
Huzzah!
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