Date of Award
Spring 2020
Document Type
Thesis
Department
English
First Reader
Dr. Amy Sonheim
Second Reader
Professor Sarah Smith
Third Reader
Dr. Bethany Hicks
Abstract
When I was in the fourth grade, sitting at a round wooden table at the end of our kitchen, I wrote the first story that made me proud. My mom, Karrie Goodman, had taught me how to turn the dinosaur of a laptop on, plugging in the dial-up and giving enough time for the machine to whirl to life. At the time, we had a CD player nestled onto a shelf nearby, which was where I began my first inklings of a writing process, a writing preference. At that malleable age of barely ten years old, I preferred a glass of water to my left, Michael Buble’s Crazy Love album on low, and Microsoft Word set to Bookman Old Style font. I spent entire afternoons sitting criss-cross-apple-sauce in a kitchen chair, my index fingers flying across the chunky keyboard of an old PC.
That first story that made me proud was entitled A Journey to Heaven and it lasted all of about fifty computer pages, single spaced. It told the story of a brother, sister, and their cousin counterparts as they adventured through the traumatic unfolding of a house robbery and subsequent family upheaval. I printed the self-proclaimed book and took it to my Gifted and Talented (G/T) class at school, where I was given the opportunity to read it to my friends and classmates. I was hoping they would spew my praises. But while reading my work aloud, I began what was the first process of self-editing, stumbling over paragraphs that didn’t fit in, sentences that didn’t flow, words misspelled. When I finished reading, I stacked my papers to signal the end. I was aware that I, personally, had edits to make, yet I knew even then I would be hesitant to make them. But all I hoped was that my class liked it. Did they see its worth? Did they understand my characters? Did they think I was a good author?
Then my teacher leaned back and crossed her arms, asking the class to give any pointers. And I sat there, teeth clenched and hands cold, as my hard work was criticized. Unfortunately, every last one of them was blunt.
I hated it. If my writing was good, why didn’t they like it?
Recommended Citation
Goodman, Adeline, "Editing the Editor" (2020). Honors Theses. 762.
https://scholarlycommons.obu.edu/honors_theses/762