On Writing

I was reading an article on horror done by a college English professor, which includes a lot of references to the reaction of his students. Among the things it brought to mind were my own reactions to English Lit classes.
specifically: "Ugh"

Lucky for me I started reading at a very early age, so even the dread of literary analysis couldn't entirely sap me of my love for the written word. It was a close thing though. Let's face it, I seriously doubt anyone involved in producing early writing or type setting or anything else involved in the art ever expected to have a roomful of people carefully analyzing some of the dullest phrases for their "deeper meanings." I can remember a three page short taking as many weeks because so much time was spent on "understanding" the "deeper meanings" within the work. In the mean time we all completely forgot what the book was about. A three page story and every one of us managed to forget who the main character was.

Well despite this horror, I've started to write anyway. I just hope noone is ever subjected to a search for meaning in any of my stories in some English class. I remember one teacher making it quite clear that despite my best efforts at producing a story with ABSOLUTELY no meaning beyond what is said in the words, it had that meaning anyway and we had best discover it. Ugh.

I suppose it's likely it did have some sort of meaning. This stuff usually does, but that doesn't mean you were meant to spend weeks over-analyzing it. If it comes to you, great, you've gotten more out of it then you expected. If not, well I hope you enjoyed the show.

(p.s. the title is a reference to a book of the same title by Stephen King. You should read it.)