Writing Style

Bob Dylan was a master of messing with the press. Throughout his early career he was constantly hounded by them wherever he went. He was playful, sarcastic, and often bewildered by the constant attention. While on tour in Australia back in 1966, someone asked him why he wore such “outlandish clothes.” In a typical sardonic Dylan reply he said “I look very normal where I live.” Style is a fascinating subject, especially when you start thinking about it in relation to writing. When I taught writing to my high school seniors, inevitably, the topic would always come up. To me, writing styles are like flavors-some will naturally appeal to you, some can become an acquired taste if you stick with them long enough, and others will never connect with you no matter what you do. Trying to argue with someone about liking or disliking a style is like telling someone they are wrong for preferring one flavor over another. 

I always told my students that style needs to suit the purpose. If you are writing something formal, then it makes sense to stay within that confine, but if not, then the style is up to you. I often joked with my students that there were English teachers who would correct the great writers of the past. If Hemingway sat in a modern writing class, most teachers would say “Ernie, could you maybe connect some of these short, terse sentence structures so things could flow a little better?” Hemingway would probably punch them in the mouth and go win a Pulitzer Prize. The same would have gone for Faulkner. “Hey Willie, do you think you could stop with the long, overdrawn sentence structures? I have to read some of your paragraphs twice for them to make sense.” He would ignore their suggestion like a southern gentleman, and go win a Pulitzer Prize of his own. 

As an English major, I was exposed to all sorts of styles and I truly enjoyed discussing and analyzing them but when it comes to thinking about your own style? That’s a whole different experience. Remember, my belief is that style suits the purpose. I could have elevated the style and written a totally different book but that wasn’t my purpose. I wanted to convey my true experience so to be honest, this one is completely me. One thing that I have heard people say (especially those who have known me personally and professionally) is that when they are reading my book, they can hear me saying the things that I have written. That is certainly because in writing this book, I didn’t just use a conversational writing style (which is how I would describe it); it really is me “naked as a tree” as David Gray calls it in his 2015 song “Back in the World.”  

I think that’s why it freaked me out a little early on. When they finally released it in mid January, it was only available for pre-order. A lot of friends and family told me that they had ordered theirs and I was very excited but no one had the book yet. It really didn’t hit me until my Aunt Leslie texted me the Sunday after its release. She said she had bought it on Kindle and was reading it at that very moment. Hilariously, I wasn’t ready for that. I got nervous, my hands started sweating, and I started pacing around the house. My wife asked me what was wrong and I said “Leslie’s reading it right now! She’s actually reading my book!” To calm me down, my wife lovingly asked “Isn’t that what you wanted?” Of course, it was what I wanted but for some reason the knowledge that someone was actually reading what I had worked on for the past year and a half terrified me momentarily. Thankfully, she loved it and she really went out of her way to encourage me which really helped ease my mind. I never thought I would be so neurotic about it but it was touch and go there for a moment. 

When you write a book about your own experiences, you can’t escape the fact that there will always be a self-serving aspect to it. The sheer act of putting it out there is a supposition that people will be interested in your experiences. You run the risk of being pretentious and maybe you can never truly escape that. But I wanted my focus to be on the stories of the people I encountered who changed me and I hope that’s what has come across. And I wanted to share these stories to help others who have been or will be going through similar experiences.

But where did this conversational style come from? In college, I took two “Modern” literature classes at the University of Kentucky. The “Modern British Novel” and the “Modern American Novel” both of which got me into literature from the early to the mid twentieth century. Of all of those writers, Hemingway probably influenced me the most. I love his simple, yet profound sentences that contain worlds. One of my favorites is “He was an old man who fished alone in a skiff in the Gulf Stream and he had gone eighty-four days now without taking a fish.” Simple, direct, and everything you need to know, yet it leaves you with a world yet to be discovered. 

I’m not arrogant enough to compare myself to Hemingway or any other great writer. I’m just honest enough to admit that what appeals to us is probably inescapable in its influence, consciously or not.