The Inwardness of the Outward Gaze: Learning and Teaching Through Philosophy

One question aspiring authors frequently ask me is, "How do I get started in the writing business?" After stating the obvious answer, "By writing," I might go deeper by explaining what other established writers did on their way from obscurity to fame and acclaim: "Start small." Many novelists started as short story writers and either collected their published stories as a volume or expanded one or more of those stories into a larger literary work. Writers of any type do the same. Playwrights often begin with short plays leading to full-length ones, poets with a diverse batch of published poems that they shape into a book-length collection, and essayists with a single 1,500-word article on a subject they later master, leading to a comprehensive treatment in a 75,000-word study. Starting small minimizes the risk of wasting huge chunks of times on a potentially abandoned project, mitigates the pain of receiving countless rejections from publishers, and hastens the gratification of completing a project.

The next question I might hear is, "But even starting small, where do I start?" The temptation is to give the curt answer: "Start by writing what you know." Instead, I say, "Start with what you have already written." By reviewing past writing, the novice becomes an instant editor, reviewing a manuscript for quality just as a professional editor would.

Starting small and using what I had were the case with my book The Inwardness of the Outward Gaze: Learning and Teaching Through Philosophy. This book is a collection of 17 essays, 7 of which appeared in various literary and scholarly print and online journals, and 4 more of which appeared in publications after the book release. I wrote some of these essays in response to my eclectic reading, some as presentations for professional conferences, and even some as homework assignments when in a doctoral program. None of my work went to waste, especially when I saw a pattern emerge among these pieces.

The common bond of these essays is my passion for education, writing, and philosophy. The first essay, the prologue, titled "Reflections of the Inner Voice," describes how writers and writing teachers might integrate their reading and living experiences to realize their inner voice. The first section, "Foundations," collects 11 essays on great ideas from Western educational philosophy, including works of Plato, Aristotle, Quintilian, Augustine, Aquinas, Erasmus, Vico, Hume, Kant, Diderot, Rousseau, Dewey, Kierkegaard, Nietzsche, Dostoevsky, Camus, and Sartre. This part provides new writers and writing teachers with a basis from which they may ground their learning and teaching strategies. The middle section, "Considerations," offers 2 more essays as a means of assessing the writing and teaching profession. The final section, "Applications," includes 3 practical approaches for the writing teacher: in integrating the personal and the professional, and in dealing with administrators, and in teaching students. 

Writing students and teachers, developing writers, and armchair philosophers will find some of their own ideas in this book--and they'll be sure to discover an idea or two along the way. So write what you know and start with what you have.

Philip Vassallo's Amazon Author Page

Since people have been asking me about my books, especially aspiring writers, I have decided to share my author page on Amazon. With a click on the image above, you can go there to read about and buy my eight published books: three on work-related writing (How to Write Fast Under Pressure, The Art of E-mail Writing, and The Art of On-the-Job Writing), two essay collections (Person to Person and The Inwardness of the Outward Gaze), two poetry collections ( American Haiku and Like the Day I Was Born), and one short play collection (Questions Asked of Dying Dreams).

I will write more about these books in future posts.

A Powerful Look at Our Youth Culture

Drama lives. At its best, it offers profound insights into the human condition and our cultural mores. Besides focused writing and reading, few better ways exist to hone the writer's craft than to experience a compelling piece of live theater that merges comedic and tragic elements through deep, believable characters and an unusual yet accessible story line.

This weekend audiences continue to get such an opportunity as previews of Kenneth Lonergan's play This Is Our Youth started on Broadway. I saw this exceptional production with the same cast (Michael Cera, Kieran Culkin, and Tavi Gevinson) and director (Anna D. Shapiro) at the Steppenwolf Theatre in Chicago on June 25. This production has no kinks to iron out, so I encourage theatergoers to purchase less expensive preview tickets.

A two-hour tragicomedy about aimless New York youth in the 1980s during the Reagan Era, the play premiered Off-Broadway in 1996 at the Intar Theatre and has since been staged in London, Melbourne, and other major cities. Yet 18 years after the first staging and 32 years after the date of play's setting, it remains a painfully relevant story about how the excesses of society have devastating consequences on our communication, aspirations, and relationships.

Popular AMA Webinar on Email to Rerun on August 26

In the 11 years that I have been associated with the American Management Association, I have had the pleasure of delivering for this international organization 92 classroom courses, 14 live online courses, and 19 webinars; completing 15 designing or revising projects; and writing a book. One of the mainstays of my work for AMA has been the How to Write a Darn Good Email, a webinar which I designed in 2006 and have since revised twice. This highly interactive program has run live several times every year since then for thousands of participants around the world.

During the 90-minute webinar, attendees answer poll questions to get a reality check on the most common perceptions about good writing, and they get the chance to ask questions themselves about email best practices.  It runs again on August 26, and you can register for it by clicking here. 

Oakland: Bookshops a Plenty

An unending lament of most bibliophiles is the disappearance of independent bookstores like Gotham Book Mart, Coliseum Books, Academy Books, and Skyline Books, all in New York City and even chain booksellers like Borders, B. Dalton Bookseller, and Waldenbooks, making us wonder how long Barnes & Noble will endure.

For this reason, I am always excited to arrive in the Rockridge-Piedmont sections of Oakland, California, where the small bookseller inexplicably lives. Within a short, enjoyable walk past boutique shops, gourmet supermarkets, fine restaurants, and beautiful homes set on tree-lined streets, you can find seven terrific bookshops, each with its unique charm and collections of new and used books. I make sure I support them during brief stays in the area. 

Once you check them out, you'll love Oakland! Here they are: 

• Spectator Books, 4163 Piedmont Avenue
• Owl and Company Bookshop, 3941 Piedmont Avenue
• Black Swan Books, 4236 Piedmont Avenue
• Book Zoo, 14 Glen Avenue
• Issues, 20 Glen Avenue
• Diesel, 5433 College Avenue
• Pegasus Books, 5560 College Avenue

BOOK BRIEF: "On Writer's Block" by Victoria Nelson

On Writer's Block: A New Approach to Creativity by Victoria Nelson focuses not on writing quality but on writing attitude. I wrote such a book myself (How to Write Fast Under Pressure by AMACOM Books), but I direct mine to business and technical writers, while Nelson look more at the novelist, essayist, playwright, and poet. Nevertheless, writers of any stripe would appreciate the universal wisdom and commonsense viewpoint appearing throughout On Writer's Block.

Nelson, an accomplished author of books on diverse subjects and professor of creative writing in several MFA programs, starts with two simple premises: 1) writer's block, the temporary or chronic inability to write one's thoughts, is natural and inevitable for all writers regardless of their achievements; and 2) writers, especially novices, should learn to live with writer's block and use it to their advantage.

As strange as those ideas may seem to aspiring writers, they are true, and On Writer's Block alludes to master authors to prove its point. Nelson admonishes writers for trying to fight writer's block as if it's an enemy, encouraging a more accepting posture that focuses on understanding its connection to our personality and proclivities. She examines its sources, not the least of which are unrealistic expectations and maddening perfectionism, as well as a blind acceptance of the popular culture's romantic perception of what constitutes a writer's life.

Readers looking for techniques to write more proficiently and prolifically should look elsewhere; however, if they want insights into how to deal with their psyche as writer's block approaches and lingers, they've come to the right book in On Writer's Block. 

BOOK BRIEF: "Teach Yourself ... Linguistics" by Jean Aitchison

As a primer for the new language student, Jean Aitchison's Linguistics is an excellent choice. In 257 pages, she covers with accuracy, clarity, and simplicity so many key topics of the discipline that it might be best to simply provide an overview of  the book:

• end-of-chapter review questions, which the reader should be able to answer correctly before moving to the next chapter
• a synopsis of the history of language (Chapters 1-3)
• a lucid description of the elements of grammar, namely, phonology, syntax, and semantics (Chapter 4)
• a precis on English and universal sounds, including phonemes and allophones (Chapters 5 and 6) 
• a deeper analysis of how sentence structure interacts with word meaning (Chapters 7 and 8)
• a look at the broader context of language in everyday discourse through pragmatics (Chapter 9), sociolinguistics (Chapter 10), psycholinguistics (Chapter 11), and literature (Chapter 12)
• a discussion of the influences on the language evolution (Chapters 13 through 15)
• a high-level review of modern language structural theory (Chapters 16 through 18)

The Teach Yourself series, an imprint of  British-based Hodder Education, has been publishing instructional books since 1938, reaching tens of millions of readers worldwide. Unquestionably, Linguistics makes a strong case to review more of this publisher's volumes.