Writing the Draft

I'm taking the same approach to writing the draft that I did with the reading paper. I just sit down with a few ideas of the direction that I want to take the paper in, then I just start to freewrite. I've found out that I develop my ideas in a much more logical way. I make one transition to another instead of always trying to write a paper that proves something. I don't know how well this method would work when I have to write a persuasive paper; but for the research and reading paper, this method has helped me expand on my ideas and intuition about the main text.

This is completely different from what I was taught in middle school and high school. Then, I was taught to outline my paper with a thesis and three sub-arguments that support my thesis. It was really formulaic and I liked that. But I always had trouble coming up with a thesis and the arguments. It was even worse when I'm halfway through with my paper to only find that my sub-arguments don't match my main thesis. I would just get lazy and finish the paper with how I had outlined it. But now, I can start off with a premise or question that I would have about the text. From there, I can add my ideas and answer some of my questions about the text. In this way, I slowly work my way to a greater/better understanding of the text.

I'm also noticing that some of the critics who write articles about The Blithedale Romance take the same approach. Richard Brodhead starts his paper noticing that Zenobia is described in very physical terms, much like what we noticed in class when we were talking about the novel. From there, he noticed more stuff about the book and kept refining his ideas about the book. By the end of his article, he came to a final thesis and understanding of the novel that was completely different from how he first approached it. I found this really cool.