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Book Notes
Divide writing time into thirds:
- Idea generation
- Composition
- Editing and style
Three rules for ordering of arguments:
- Make concessions to the opposition first
- Devote at least one paragraph to every major pro argument in your thesis statement
- Save your best argument for last.
Highlights
It is important that you retype your material, even if you’re mostly copying out the original, for small but cumulative changes, corrections, and linking phrases will occur to you as you go along. That way, you reengage your material, converting the static record of your previous thought into active thinking. By retyping you will be doing more than merely shifting prose blocks about scissors-and-paste style. (Page 35)
When School was safely behind me I began to write ‘essays’ again. I learned to trust the divagations of the mind. If you let the reins loose the horse will find its way home. The shape was something which grew inside the essay, during the revision-you didn’t have to think it out beforehand.
— British novelist Graham Greene