Writer's Block

[verybaddmom]

Please, help me!

I have writer's block, and im so frustrated that im almost in tears. i have been working on this paper for so long now, that i think part of the problem is that im tired of the subject. that, and i have done so much research and read so much information, that i have really no idea how to focus it and where to start.
but the fact remains that the beastly thing still has to be written, and soon. and the more i try and write it the worse it seems to get. i write three words, then erase five; the paper seems to be shrinking, which is frustrating....and on the cycle goes...

any tried and/or true suggestions for getting past this block..and FAST???

[simon]

That always happens to me in the middle of a huge paper, I suddenly get bored. There's no real technique to get out of it, you just have to perservere. Just babble on paper, outline, don't just dive into the paper. Go outside and scream, screaming is fun, then drink hot chocolate or wine.

[amuse]

i shouldn't tell you this, but i berkeley's valedictorian gave me an a on my paper (he read for my instructor) on a humanities paper i couldn't complete/pull out of my *** until 12 hours before it was due. maybe you work best under pressure?

do you have the first sentence/paragraph yet? i can't write papers until i "hear" that, but once that hurdle's jumped, the paper writes itself. maybe talk out loud to yourself, vbm?
i would keep writing and writing. eventually the words will vomit themselves up for you. like the heimlich maneuver, kind of...

ihrocks posted this same topic, if you can find help here:
http://www.golala.com/forums/index.php?mforum=CrossedKeys&showtopic=92

[emily655321]

It's been a little while since I've written anything as long as a paper, but being the resident Mistress of Procrastination, I have a good many late-night panic sessions under my belt. The best I can tell you is I always go for the standard model of

Intro --

topic 1 --

topic 2 --

topic 3--

[etc]

Conclusion

Then at the top of the page I tack on all the quotes and random thoughts I plan to use on individual lines, then delineate topics to each "topic" on the list, and gradually flesh it out from there. I don't know. I always end up going from "I can't think of a single thing" to typing furiously and not having enough time to write everything I've thought of.

[simon]

Words do tend to vomit, often when not wanted

[verybaddmom]

oh Em, i wish... the problem is not that i cant come up with ideas, the problem, i think, is that i have too many, and of course, trying to focus to a thesis is killing me. i know you will probably barf (speaking of vomitting) but i decided to do a research paper on Oscar Wilde (not one word out of you....im warning you!). and i have read every obscure little biography and essay written about him, i know every step of his life that i could possibly have found in the last almost four months, but what kind of thesis does that get me...?
arrrrrgggghhhh...thank you simon. that felt better. now where's the wine?

[amuse]

Tell Us about Oscar. There! I for one haven't read the man's work since my early twenties, gimme some info, gimme gimme gimme (is the block wearing off yet maybe?)
seriously, when's it due? i'd love to read something cohesive about him as i haven't decided whether to reread his stuff yet. and you could start chewing the figurative fat here if you'd like.

[verybaddmom]

here is my introductory paragraph amuse....that's about all i got..

Oscar Wilde was one of Britain’s most eminent writers of the late 1800’s. Besides being terribly witty and remarkably articulate, he was also one of the most talked about members of society due to his profound refusal to adhere to social norms. He was a trendsetter and a non-conformist who earned his way, via his intellect and wit, into the society he later affronted in his literary works with each opportunity he was given. However, while he was for a time accepted and supported by polite society in England, his predilection towards homosexuality and blatant disregard for social rules eventually forced him to adopt pretenses towards accepting and following social rules, mostly to allow him to continue to make a living. This affected air of respectability that he attempted to portray led him to lead a double life of sorts: engaging in behaviors that satisfied his desires, while attempting to maintain an air of respectability. Wilde’s references to his own double life as well as the frustration and impossibility of maintaining it are clear within his play, “The Importance of Being Earnest”.

and seriously it was due today, but she gave me till tomorrow because of my brutal work schedule and extenuating circumstances. of couse, she doesnt know how much time i spend on this forum....:eek:

[emily655321]

Yeah, dude. Spew your notes, let 'em coagulate in our little heeds, we'll talk back at you. Besides, trying to summarize for other people what I've got usually ends in me breaking off and going "I got it!" all inspiration-like. :D

[amuse]

Originally posted by verybaddmom
late 1800’s...witty...articulate
refusal to adhere to social norms
a trendsetter and a non-conformist
earned his way, via his intellect and wit, into the society he later affronted in his literary works
accepted and supported by polite society in England...predilection towards homosexuality and blatant disregard for social rules
adopt pretenses towards accepting and following social rules
allow him to continue to make a living
led him to lead a double life of sorts
references to his own double life as well as the frustration and impossibility of maintaining it are clear within his play, “The Importance of Being Earnest”.

what are the 3 points in the essay? how long (pages or words) does it have to be? you do have some major themes in here you could focus on; it's a wonderful beginning what time is class?

[verybaddmom]

classes are finished, so i really have to get this darn thing in asap....

i have not decided on three points. i was originally going to go with the "earnest" connection, but i dont want to focus on just one work of his...maybe to add in dorian gray?

and the paper needs to be between 1500-2000 words. i have all my research material, many secondary sources, and once i have a nice little outline diagramed like the one Em posted, i am good to go, its the gosh blasted thesis...unfocused, like bleach in eyes!

[amuse]

do you wanna share the contents of your outline with us?
only cuz maybe you'll see the thesis if you do that, like doing a maze in reverse...

[verybaddmom]

well, em...the way it goes is this:

im fascinated by his relationship with Boise (Lord Alfred Douglas) as he was totally used by this spoiled younger guy, actually reminds me a bit of the beginning of "Dorian" when Basil is fawning all over Dorian because of his youth and beauty...

Wilde spent two years in prison, hard labour, which destroyed not only his career but also his vitality and some of his optimism. He spent this time in prison, not because he was gay (as the charges read) but because he tried to sue and imprison a very powerful man (Boise's father actually) and this was only because boise pushed him to (bad father son relations anyone?) it was at this time that he wrote "De Profundis". and shortly after his release from prison, he wrote "ballad of reading Gaol"
and then within two years, he died...penniless in a hotel, still witty as heck, saying "it was me or the wallpaper, one of us had to go"

[emily655321]

The best advice I ever got for paper-writing was that each sentence in the Intro should be one paragraph of the paper, and vice versa. So I usually write the thesis, then the body, then the intro, then for the conclusion I restate the thesis and each sentence in the intro (reworded, of course) with the conclusions I want the prof to draw from each paragraph added on to the end of each sentence. With your intro I would make this outline, filling in each paragraph-bullet with the research facts that support that topic sentence....

INTRO -- [check.]

THESIS: Wilde’s references to his own double life as well as the frustration and impossibility of maintaining it are clear within his play, “The Importance of Being Earnest”.

1 -- date of birth, general bio

2 -- He was a trendsetter and a non-conformist who earned his way, via his intellect and wit, into society

3 -- he was one of the most talked about members of society due to his profound refusal to adhere to social norms.

4 -- he later affronted in his literary works with each opportunity he was given.

5 -- while he was for a time accepted and supported by polite society in England, his predilection towards homosexuality and blatant disregard for social rules eventually forced him to adopt pretenses towards accepting and following social rules, mostly to allow him to continue to make a living.

6 -- This affected air of respectability that he attempted to portray led him to lead a double life of sorts: engaging in behaviors that satisfied his desires, while attempting to maintain an air of respectability.

CONC -- Reword thesis. Briefly restate each topic sentence in summary, each followed by examples of such behavior in "Earnest."

[amuse]

btw, ow!!! bleach in eyes? - can just see a big white ball in sockets, no pupil or nothing, emitting bleachy smell *scared emoticon*nice simile

[amuse]

nice, em.

[emily655321]

thankee. Ideas always come to me once I do that, and it turns more into like a fill-in-the-blank sort of thing.

VBM, after reading your other post, maybe you should invert your thesis: instead of comparing a couple of plays to Wilde's life, tell how each play he wrote reflected what was going on in his life at that point in time. Possible thesis: something like, Wilde's plays are like diary entries, the story of his life through his own eyes.

[verybaddmom]

wow, i am no longer suffering from bleach. perhaps tears of relief. i think you may have just saved my butt Em.
just one question: if my thesis is "Wilde’s references to his own double life as well as the frustration and impossibility of maintaining it are clear within his play, “The Importance of Being Earnest”.", then should every body paragraph that follows not be written with the sole purpose of supporting that?
i love what you have done with those intro sentences, but i understood that everything in the body of the essay is in existence only to support and prove whatever is claimed in the thesis...if that is the case, then i need to talk less about Wilde, and more about "Earnest" right?

maybe i could just take "earnest" right out of the thesis, and just talk about Wilde in his society...but i still need a strong argument of some sort for my thesis right? am i totally off base?

you have no idea how grateful i am to both of you right now... if you were in my country i would cook you both dinner and rub your feet....thank you

[amuse]

it's kind of cozy, isn't it...i don't think you need an argument necessarily, just a whammy of a "this was Wilde's life and these are the plays inspired by it" if you do the societal thing
but definitely if your thesis talks about "Earnest" your paper's gotta reflect that...

[emily655321]

Yeah -- first of all, you're welcome :D -- but, yeah, I like doing "bullet" paragraphs instead of trying to chop up one point and then glue it back together with the conclusion. Much easier to go through play-by-play (awful pun) and glue those together with the bio of his life you already have.

[verybaddmom]

first, great pun not awful.
and im not entirely sure i get exactly what you mean...bullet paragraphs, chop one point and glue it together with conclusion? eh?

[emily655321]

Sorry, hope you're still there. Okay, I need to spend more time talking to people outside of my head. :p First I mean that I agree with az -- an easier topic than "Earnest" (or even "Earnest" and "Dorian") would be to relate each stage of his life to the play he wrote during those years. When I said "bullet" I was referring to the (bulleted) list of the outline, where each topic in the list is a paragraph in the paper -- two if you're inspired. :p

The ultimate goal (thesis) of any paper you write is to stand as a depiction of Wilde's Life (one topic), and within the body you must apply another single topic to it. To do this you break each topic down into pieces (paragraphs) and pair them up -- one aspect of Earnest to one aspect of Wilde's Life per paragraph.

In your outline you have Wilde's Life already broken down into digestible sections. To do "Earnest," you have to break "Earnest" (one topic) down into sections and apply each one to each section (paragraph) of Wilde's Life. If you think of the Conclusion as the "glue" of the paper, in it you will refer to Wilde's Life once again as One Topic, thereby drawing back together the different aspects of "Earnest" you applied to the different parts of Wilde's Life -- thereby recreating the Thesis as a proven point. The trouble with an "Earnest" paper is that you have to take the time to sort out "Earnest" into different pieces, and there's really not enough time to do it well.

If you do all the plays as they relate to Wilde's life, then you've already got the pieces -- 1) The major events of Wilde's Life are all laid out chronologically. 2) Each play can be applied to each event (one per paragraph). 3) The thesis refers to Wilde's Life as one topic, and his plays as one topic (his Body of Work), so... 4) In the Conclusion, restate the thesis and the life divided among each paragraph of the paper automatically returns to One Topic, and you can then refer to the Plays as his Body of Work (one topic). And it's all glued up in a nice conclusion.



**I said "Earnest" way way way too much in the 3rd paragraph. :p

[verybaddmom]

im speechless

[emily655321]

good things I hope?

[verybaddmom]

take a bow. that was inspiring.

[emily655321]

LOL. Yay! You should have seen the mess it was at first. :D

[verybaddmom]

lol...
well be proud, i printed that!
;)

[emily655321]

Haha! So so so happy it helped. I should probably print it to, for future reference. :p

[verybaddmom]

lol
now tell us about these people in your head...
:p

[emily655321]

Hahaha. Whenever I make a stupid spelling mistake, like "to" instead of "too," it's actually them. :p

[verybaddmom]

LMAO

[verybaddmom]

just wanted to let you know that the paper is complete, turned in and patiently awaiting a grade. unfortunately my conclusion sucketh (very weak) but i wrote until i had to go to work, so i was literally proofreading while i was blow drying my hair. i actually was in such a hurry to get to work on time, that i very nearly forgot to hit the send button on my email...
oh, thank goodness that is over. i enjoyed the research part thoroughly, but absolutely despised the writing and that almost never happens to me...i pray it never happens again.
thank you all for your help in my time of need. i wont forget it....

[emily655321]

Yay, VBM! You're welcome, any time. LOL I've definitely been there. Actually, I don't believe I have ever finished a paper before the day it was due... Oh yeah, I'm ready for college. Ouch.

Anyway, much luck! *crosses fingers* Not that you'll need it. :D :D

[IWilKikU]

Well, I'll be on here fighting writers block vigorously for the next few nights. I've got a little art essay, a bigger ethics essay, and a big ol' Henry VIII essay due this week. grr... I'll be writing my art essay tonight, than Ethics some time this week, but History I havn't even began reading for :( :( :( :eek: <whimper> :(

[verybaddmom]

oooh poor kik, if there is anything we can do....well, nevermind, you already owe me a cookie

hehe. i know nothing about ethics (ahem), less about art and negative amounts about ...who was it again?
but i will be around to offer what support i can
GOOD LUCK!!!
*Hug*

[amuse]

kik! good luck with all of it, we're here for you, and!!! pick up notre dame later! it'll take us all time to get through it, i think. i for one will still be reading it in july.
*proofreads, realizes "july" was supposed to read "may" :confused: :D

[Corlen]

Guys, just go out side play for a few minutes and rest your brain. The human brain can only handle so much work before it cracks up.