The Writing Life

A stream of rambling nonsense that has nothing to teach about writing or anything else.
If you start reading it and tell yourself that " it must get better if I just read a little further", you will be disappointed.
On the bright side - the existence of this book proves that anyone can become a published author - anyone

I took a pink highlighter to this book. I rarely, if ever, mark up any of my books in such a way, but it seemed as though, on every other page, Annie Dillard imparted some sort of wisdom or insight that I didn't want to forget. I marked them so I could find them easily later. The trouble is, I may have marked up more than half of the book so, in the end, I'm not sure what kind of good it did me.

The Writing Life is different from all those other books that promise to show you how to write a best-selling novel or structure your plot or flesh out your characters. It isn't an instruction book on how to write, it is simply a book about the personal process of writing. There are no matter-of-fact formulas or handy-dandy checklists. What I loved about Annie Dillard's book were the stories that simply and beautifully illustrated the breadth and the depth and the passion and the pain of what it means to write and what we discover when we do it.

The Writing Life is a short book, only a little over a hundred pages in my copy. It's a quick read, but it's a thoughtful one. My copy already looks as though I've owned it and loved it for a lifetime, and as I read it again (and again) in the future I may find passages that didn't speak to me before and I'll probably take a highlighter to them as well. Maybe I'll change the color though.

For new or aspiring writers, some of the earlier chapters are by turns cautionary (writing is often damn hard work) and exhortative (the line-paragraph-chapter-piece can sometimes be almost magical, making one ask 'Did that come from me?'). Some of the book is rather too personal for the title ("The Writing Life"), but the prose is lovely, and she is both poet and writer, so where's the harm? For those who have done or at least tried writing (whether creative or academic/professional), Dillard's descriptions of its frustrations and challenges will ring true and familiar. For anyone, young or older, who may have thought, "I think I may try to be a writer," read the first half of the book. It may cure you.

One of my all time favourite writing books. A lyrical approach to the topic of being a writer with prose that dances and sings in the brain long after you've finished reading it. It's full of little snapshots of Dillard's writing life - all replete with meaning and wisdom. Some of the vignettes have stayed with me and inform my own practice, others I'm surprised and delighted to be reminded of when I reread, and I do reread this book often.

Sometimes, when my head and writing hand is full of the voice of other writers, I open this book up again and read it. Just a few sentences. It's like a sorbet for my writing palate which cleanses and refreshes and wipes it clean again for my next bit of writing.

This is a book I would hate to be without.

I read this book about twenty years ago and liked it most in the first and last thirds covering the needs for a degree of isolation and analogy with the ocean tides when a writer is unproductive and losing ground, then reverses and is swept toward success but after two passages in opposite directions is often is back at a starting point rather than at success. The midsection seemed like a lot of filler in the form philosophizing about what it's like to be a writer. The last third was about how writing is analogous to being a stunt pilot who looks cool, calm and collected before a performance but takes on the persona of someone in a state of heightened awareness, in pain with a frozen face and without a personality. I just finished it a second time and my impression reversed. I thought the start and ending were filler with the real gems in the middle. I think chapter five without anything else is worth the price of the book.

One of the best book-length discussions by a prominent writer on what the writing life is really like that I've ever read. Dillard describes her writing life as hard, lonely work with long hours in front of her typewriter, and blank pages waiting, and waiting. Waiting for inspiration and requiring her to push herself past boredom, past wondering if anything and true WILL come.

Contends that writers must remind themselves that the main thing to remember is to keep going -- to string one word after the other, then one sentence after another, and see where it all leads. To write TRUTH -- to write as if the words and sentences are for a dying person and then go back and cut out all the words that won't mean anything to that person.

I enjoyed her description of WHERE she wrote. Though --not to her -- to an outsider, many would think her life to be a romantic life. It's hard work and she suggests that would-be writers pour their effort and soul into one book. To just work at it until the project gives one the sense of being aboard a ship coming into port.

I thought the ending was handled well -- where she discussed a stunt pilot's approach to flying: "When [Dave] Rahm flew, he sat down in the middle of art. He strapped himself in."

It's an interesting contrast to my own experience in writing -- as with me, writing is a compulsion, a need that has to be filled; an experience that brings a sense of completion to who I am and what is meaningful in life. Of course, I focus on non-fiction -- the rendering of reality in words and Dillard focuses on fiction. A whole different world.

But, I'm not sure I would enjoy writing nearly as much if -- like Dillard -- I found it to be a lonely, somewhat boring challenge.

R. Neil Scott
Middle Tennessee State University

One of my all time favourite writing books. A lyrical approach to the topic of being a writer with prose that dances and sings in the brain long after you've finished reading it. It's full of little snapshots of Dillard's writing life - all replete with meaning and wisdom. Some of the vignettes have stayed with me and inform my own practice, others I'm surprised and delighted to be reminded of when I reread, and I do reread this book often.

Sometimes, when my head and writing hand is full of the voice of other writers, I open this book up again and read it. Just a few sentences. It's like a sorbet for my writing palate which cleanses and refreshes and wipes it clean again for my next bit of writing.

This is a book I would hate to be without.

I read this book about twenty years ago and liked it most in the first and last thirds covering the needs for a degree of isolation and analogy with the ocean tides when a writer is unproductive and losing ground, then reverses and is swept toward success but after two passages in opposite directions is often is back at a starting point rather than at success. The midsection seemed like a lot of filler in the form philosophizing about what it's like to be a writer. The last third was about how writing is analogous to being a stunt pilot who looks cool, calm and collected before a performance but takes on the persona of someone in a state of heightened awareness, in pain with a frozen face and without a personality. I just finished it a second time and my impression reversed. I thought the start and ending were filler with the real gems in the middle. I think chapter five without anything else is worth the price of the book.

One of the best book-length discussions by a prominent writer on what the writing life is really like that I've ever read. Dillard describes her writing life as hard, lonely work with long hours in front of her typewriter, and blank pages waiting, and waiting. Waiting for inspiration and requiring her to push herself past boredom, past wondering if anything and true WILL come.

Contends that writers must remind themselves that the main thing to remember is to keep going -- to string one word after the other, then one sentence after another, and see where it all leads. To write TRUTH -- to write as if the words and sentences are for a dying person and then go back and cut out all the words that won't mean anything to that person.

I enjoyed her description of WHERE she wrote. Though --not to her -- to an outsider, many would think her life to be a romantic life. It's hard work and she suggests that would-be writers pour their effort and soul into one book. To just work at it until the project gives one the sense of being aboard a ship coming into port.

I thought the ending was handled well -- where she discussed a stunt pilot's approach to flying: "When [Dave] Rahm flew, he sat down in the middle of art. He strapped himself in."

It's an interesting contrast to my own experience in writing -- as with me, writing is a compulsion, a need that has to be filled; an experience that brings a sense of completion to who I am and what is meaningful in life. Of course, I focus on non-fiction -- the rendering of reality in words and Dillard focuses on fiction. A whole different world.

But, I'm not sure I would enjoy writing nearly as much if -- like Dillard -- I found it to be a lonely, somewhat boring challenge.

R. Neil Scott
Middle Tennessee State University

The 'Paris Review Interviews' which were started by George Plimpton interviewed over at least two decades scores of writers on questions of their writing habits and practices. Hemingway sharpened dozens of pencils before beginning the day's work, and Faulkner told us about how he read no contemporary authors but only returned again and again to the eternal favorites to Shakespeare and Cervantes. In her essay here Annie Dillard discusses her own unique habits as a writer, and tells how she thinks about it, and practices her craft. She discusses the difficulties for her of the writing life, and the intense and painful practice of bringing work to the level she finds right. A longtime reader and interpreter of Thoreau she has something of his devotion to nature, and his solitary reflectiveness. She hears her own drummer and has beaten a path to the heart of many readers.
But every writer has of course to find their own way. So not the whole of the story but some hint or suggestion along the way might well prove useful to the many aspiring writers who might read this work.

In "The Writing Life," Annie Dillard reflects on the writer's craft and calling. This short book takes the form of an extended essay that is divided into several chapters. Dillard writes about the physical places in which she has actually written her work. Other topics include the relationship of the writer's vision to the actual fruits of her labor ("this changeling, this bastard"); the question of whether to write "one big book" or a series of short pieces; and a writer's relationship to the work of preceding writers. Along the way Dillard invokes the names of many other writers: Henry James, Octavio Paz, Helen Keller, Jack London, Emily Dickinson, Willa Cather, Ralph Ellison, Walt Whitman, Gertrude Stein, etc.
The final chapters deal with two people she has known: one a painter, one a stunt pilot; their crafts could be seen as metaphors for writing. I enjoyed "The Writing Life." Although at times I found Dillard's prose a bit self-indulgent, overall I found the book to be a thoughtful and well-written meditation.

I have never read anything by Annie Dillard before, but after finishing 'The Writing Life' I am eager for more. I cannot imagine that many non-writers would be interested in this type of book, but much of what Dillard has to say can easily be applied to other creative outlets as well as to living an inspired life in general. So do not be deterred, non-writers.
At the outset of the book, Dillard offers up her insights into the writing craft. This takes the form of a series of imaginative page-long pieces, many of which materialize into unique, gently-stated, and beautifully written advice. Dillard then goes on to relate a succession of experiences that somehow tie in to the life of a writer. She does an excellent job of combing through her life experiences and siphoning out the right material.
In this short but impressive little book, Dillard charms us with her wit, disarms us with her modesty, astonishes us with her resourcefulness, woos us with her insight, and comforts the writer in each of us with her encouragement. Most of Dillard's encouragement arrives through her expression of the difficulty she has encountered while writing, and it is nice to know that strong and meaningful prose does not come naturally to all great writers... and Dillard is most certainly that... a great writer.

Spectacular. I love Dillard & she does not disappoint here. This is a small book of hers and easily digestible for the faith of heart reader as they approach her more lengthy tomes. If you're a writer, you'll want to own this hardback stand-alone version as part of your permanent library.

Annie Dillard's The Writing Life is as economical a bit of art within 112 pages as Holy the Firm.
As clear a piece of imigry as Teaching A Stone to Talk. Life is a tender piece of show not tell. Dillard explains by weaving words and art and story into a readers ear and mind and heart, and gently stitches soul into the piece.
Tidbits include:
"I do not so much write a book as sit up with it, as with a dying friend. During visiting hours, I enter its room with dread and sympathy for its many disorders. I hold its hand and hope it will get better..."
"The writer studies literature, not the world. He lives in the world; he cannot miss it. If he has ever bought a hamburger, or taken a commercial airplane flight, he spares his readers a report of his experience. He is careful of what he reads, for that is what he will write. He is careful of what he learns, because that is what he will know."

Interspersed with stories of inchworms, moths, ocean currents, artists and phantom psychotic chess opponents she weaves a fine tapestry of word upon a backdrop of seaside cabins and rain.

This is an especially incoherent collection of essays. Many books about writing by published authors are a collection of essays, but this compilation lacks direction. Other books like Lamott's "Bird by Bird" or King's "On Writing" provide useful information or anecdotes. The inspiration those books provide is grounded in a common experience among authors. Dillard's "The Writing Life" comes across as stream of consciousness. Any useful information is to be interpreted; it's not actually clear that the author's essays are meant to be helpful. This may work for some readers who just enjoy her flavor of writing, but the collection as a whole reads like little better than a disjointed fiction about a protagonist who happens to also be a writer.

This lucid, lyrical, sometimes metaphysical love note to the craft and career of an author slips from the lofty and spiritual down to the earthy and practical so effortlessly it's easy to forget what a difficult trick that is to pull off without sounding clunky and uneven. Anyone who loves to read, loves to write, or feels a tickle of curiosity about the life of a novelist will appreciate this frank, funny, tightly rendered ode to a way of life.

This is a charming little book--honest, somewhat lucid, and, at times, helpful. "The Writing Life" is Dillard's reflections on her writing life, written in a way that is quite conversational. For those of you who are finding your way through your own writing life, and, as I do, often need a little encouragement, then this is a neat little book to have on your nightstand. Relax, pour yourself a cup of tea, and read a chapter or two; perhaps then take a little nap--you'll feel better in no time.

My only caution is that this 'genre' of writing is growing in strength, summoning forth both astute and sophomoric writers to join its ranks. You'll find yourself spending more and more precious time reading about the 'theory' of writing, rather than working through the pain of your own creative process. Hence, I'd suggest only engaging in this type of writing once in a while; and perhaps have only two or so of these books in your library. I recommend both this one, and a little gem by the great Canadian writer, Margaret Atwood, entitled, "Negotiating with the Dead: A Writer on Writing".

The Boston Globe calls Annie Dillard's The Writing Life a "small and brilliant guidebook to the landscape of a writer's task...." Well, what the book is in fact is a short collection of the author's observations on writing and a bunch of other things: the seventh and final chapter of the book, for example, 19 of the book's 111 pages, has to do with a stunt pilot/geologist from Washington State with whom Dillard once went flying.

Dillard's book reads like a series of journal entries, which may indeed have been its origin. Some of the entries are amusing, for example Dillard's description of her weeks-long, late-night chess game with an unknown opponent who, she briefly thinks, just might be the diaper-clad but otherwise naked baby she finds hovering around the board one evening. But some of the entries are mere poetic, well, nonsense: "The line of words is a fiber optic, flexible as wire; it illumines the path just before its fragile tip. You probe with it, delicate as a worm." The Writing Life cannot, I should think, be of any practical benefit to writers. And it is neither a "guidebook" nor a particularly inspiring piece of prose, however much the blurbists may rave. But it is intermittently interesting, and, after all, it is a very quick read.

Reviewed by Debra Hamel, author of Trying Neaira: The True Story of a Courtesan's Scandalous Life in Ancient Greece

I loved this book. I read it slowly, savoring it like dense, good chocolate.

Carolyn M. Jupp, fellow reviewer, wrote that she felt disappointed in the lack of practical writing advice. Certainly, this is not a book filled with writing excercises, stylistic suggestions, or even much in the way of encouragement. Rather, it's a peek into the mind of a profoundly talented artist and I found it infinitely more helpful than the dozens of practical writing guides I've read in the past year.

Dillard's book is filled with gorgeous metaphors, and if you look closely enough, and then maybe look up to see a cloud passing by, you will learn from them. I promise.

Annie Dillard's "The Writing Life" is probably most appreciated by the professional writer, who will admire and relate to Dillard's penetrating and insightful thoughts on the subject of writing. But this is a book for anyone who has a passion for anything. Dillard transcends the mere avocation of putting words on paper to present a simple, slim volume that represents a lust for life. Every word in "A Writing Life" detonates. A writer should keep this book handy as a wayward sinner should keep a Bible.

The Writing Life is filled with beautiful language, and many thoughts that any writer can relate to, but it is no how-to guide. Those who are looking for something to give practical guidance had best look elsewhere. Dillard descibes what it is like to be a writer - what a writer may think (or need to think). The book offers inspiration, but little practical help.
However, for those who are looking for a little pick-me-up, Dillard's book is ideal. This book would also interest avid readers who would like to see inside the mind of a writer and get some understanding of what the writing process can really be like.

Brilliant. Not what I expected, it was better. My copy was the audio book so I had the joy of hearing the beautiful prose read to me. Thank you, Annie Dillard for writing such a memorable book about The Writing Life.

I loved reading this book. It's definitely a keeper- a book to come back to again and again. It is not a toolkit. It is exactly what it says it is - a book about the writing life, what living is like for a writer. It is full of insights that will feed your life and, therefore, your writing. It's full of wisdom, wonder and wit. My favorite chapter is on the typewriter, but it's all good. Don't miss it.

Ostensibly about writing, I found The Writing Life to be profound on many levels and applicable to any pursuit of art. The honesty and profoundly moving turns of phrase are compelling. This is one of those books that when it first came out went to call my read-aholic friends that year...and now they've discovered Dillard's other, wonderous works. A book to be re-read every once in a while...and given away and enjoyed.

Above all, this book will help any aspiring writer to conquer his or her own fears about "the writing life". It always appears that "we" are the only one's that are left staring into our blank, white screens with no thoughts on what we are about to write. Well, we are proved wrong. Annie Dillard tells and takes us through her own experiences about writing, past and present.
Regardless of the type of writing you are involved in, this book will certainly give you the inspiration to continue on what seems to be a dark and narrow road.

You know that oh-so expressive word, "meh"? Well, that was kind of my reaction to Annie Dillard's slim volume, THE WRITING LIFE. I didn't find it all that exciting or enlightening. In fact there seemed to me to be a bit of ostentatious navel-gazing; maybe even a bit of intellectual 'showing off.' While there were a few semi-interesting bits here and there, like her descriptions of where she has written - a primitive cabin on an island in Puget Sound, a cinder block room in a college library, a well-equipped 'shed' on Cape Cod, etc. - there are no real revelations here about the writing life per se. Her description of her flight with a geologist-stunt pilot was interesting, and ... Ah, what the hell, maybe I just didn't 'get' what she was trying to do here.

To my mind, William Zinsser's books on writing are more useful, and certainly a lot more interesting. They are: On Writing Well, 30th Anniversary Edition: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction;Writing About Your Life: A Journey into the Past; and Writing Places: The Life Journey of a Writer and Teacher. Try those books. You'll be getting a lot more bang for your buck.

Sorry, Annie. I loved An American Childhood, but this one? Meh.

- Tim Bazzett, author of the memoir, BOOKLOVER

As a scientist, Annie Dillard's The Writing Life gave me hope. That a scientist is not much more than a specialist writer became clear to me. The same hopes, frustrations, the testing of ideas, the sometimes total absorption that a writer needs to produce a work that will not crumble to dust, these are the same things a scientist need to produce knowledge that will join what is known to what is not known, without hidden cracks and flaws.
Also, the work you throw away is always the first part, and sometimes the part you spent the most effort on. Your work turns alive in your hands, and what becomes written often is not what you started out on.
It takes years to write a book, Annie Dillard says: she is right. A PhD thesis takes two to five years to write, and that is just the start of a career! We are just fortuanate that we mostly need to write only 'short stories', and that our work is seldom read by a critical public.
Annie Dillard showed me that creativity is a deeply human activity, no matter what field you work in.

This book was not meant to inspire writers who are aiming for three books a year, and a story a day. It is not a how-to book.
It is an autobiography. More, I think it is a message from one writer to another. It's like a "hey, we all go through this."
The book itself is well written. The grammatical errors irritated me at times, but it was written in a casual tone. The practical tone it was written is nice. It's more factual than "you must do this and this and this". I enjoyed the narratives: they have opinions, and hinted ideas and suggestions, but often times you as the reader get to decide.
What i found most enjoyable about this book is actually the ironic humour. It is not "hahaha" humour. It is simply interesting reading about a fellow writer's frustrations. Indeed, Dillard's self-contempt at times can be hillarious.
I would believe that this book is meant more for those who write or have written. It's something for writers to connect with each other. It's like a mountain biker talking to another mountain biker. A baseball player would not be able to fully appreciate the difficulties and the experiences.
This is a great book though. But it's got a certain audience.

I finished this book in two quick sittings. The language is beautiful, the content is inspiring. This is the first book I've read by Dillard, now I'm purchasing her others...I enjoy the way she presents ideas and her original thinking. Writers will be nourished by this book, and everyone else will enjoy her insights...this book is as much about HOW to live a life, as choosing to live a writing life.

I recently received this book in the mail.

I opened the package and sat at my desk in my college dorm room; I had no idea what was about to happen.

The clock read 11:46 pm as I started into this short read, and I seemingly did not take a breath until I was finished with the last page over an hour later. Annie Dillard once again captured every exciting aspect of writing in one of her works, and she managed to contain it all in little over a hundred pages.

Dillard is one of the best American writers of our time, and this book proves it. It is worth ten times what you will pay for it.

If you have any passion for writing, you will love this book.
If you would like to get inside the head of the great Annie Dillard, you will love this book.

Buy it, check it out, borrow it; read it somehow.

While this book is sometimes inspiration, as I would hope it to be, it also wanders off subject in ways that are only distracting. Any book on the craft of writing is liable to have lofty portions that make great analogies between the craft and other things, but Dillard stretches things much too far while spending much too much time on it. Hearing the details of a writer's life, their quirks and struggles, is heartening and it is in this that Dillard enlightens, but I also expect a book on craft to spend more time on craft. While I want to hear how hard it was to find time to write and how priorities shift when in the throes of creative vision, but I also want to consider the details. I want to hear what other writers think about the use of first person, on whether or not one must like or at least sympathize with a protagonist. The Writing Life did none of these things. It left me feeling pretty hollow. At least it is a thin little book.

I have read, studied, underlined and written about Annie Dillard in school and to friends. It has been a few years, however, since I have read them. I can walk 20 steps from where I am sitting and typing, pick up any of her books in hard-copy. All of them were stimulating and thought provoking.

But what I REALLY want to do is to transfer them to my Kindle so I can re-read them while I travel. I especially want to carry "A Writer's Life." But, at $10 per book, I cannot do so. Phooey.

"This book recounts what the actual process of writing feels like-feels like inside the mind at work. It tells a complex story. It offers bits of technical information. It shows the writer teetering at the tip of the line of words. This is not a meditation-God save us from meditations-but a dispatch from the desk. It is all about work." This is how Anne Dillard describes her book, The Writing Life. The Writing Life is a narrative, which goes into the life of a writer, and explains the ins and outs of what a writer needs to do to have a successful book. During the information given in this book about writers, it is interrupted every so often by a writer telling their own personal story; whether it being a success or failure. This is a phenomenal resource for all perspective writers, as well as professionals, although I feel as though it lacks certain characteristics. It gives a detailed description of the writing process, but in a straight voice, adding no significance to the book, except support by having examples from other writers. This book does not just portray the "goods" of writing, but it explains the struggles one must go through to reach the highest peak of success; publication. I feel that this book is a good piece of reference material, but for enjoyment, I would stick with the newspaper.

Above all else, this book is a wonderful parable about living. In it, writing is a metaphor for life. It could readily have been named, "The Living Life," for it is full of courage, wonder, and humility. I highly recommend it.

I really like some of Annie Dillard's essays. That said, I found this book to be boring, repetitive and not needed, other than for Annie Dillard to spout off about how she writes and what she believes the writing life is and how she practices it and that writing is freedom and...If her name was not Annie Dillard, this book would have never been published.

The Writing Life is an excellent read not only for writers, but for anyone who creates in any medium. Fine artists, photographers, and craftspeople would all benefit from this insightful book. It is for anyone who wished to get to the marrow of their creative endeavor.

If like me, you thought this title held real pragmatic promise for aspiring writers, you may be disappointed, as I was, to reach the end but feeling not much the wiser for doing so.
I had been looking for an insightful guide to the mechanics of writing and among the competition this seemed the best bet. Respecting Dillard's past work gave me some genuine reason for hope that I would not be disappointed in her approach. I was also expectant of tapping that same creative and highly metaphorical vein that runs through Dillard's prose.
Perhaps you are looking for the same river. However, one has to prospect ruthlessly to find gold near the surface in The Writing Life. Like her other works, one has to go deeper than the seam to find the gem among the ordinary grit. As far as helpful material for the writer is concerned, even the deep yielded little for me. The exception to this is, is undoubtedly Chapter 5, where she finally comes the nearest to translating her thoughts into the vernacular of the general reader by highlighting the external factors that form the writer's style and vision. Her observations and comments here do shed some light on her own inimitable way of writing and also give light into a book, that up to that point, had me groping for other `light' relief. The rest deals more with the cause and effect of (her) writing, rather than rooting out causes and artistically penning the effects.
Despite its highly anecdotal and at times self-indulgent structure, The Writing Life does allow you to enter some of Dillard's wrestling to bring her heart to her subject matter, a task she executes consistently with vivacity and conviction. Like her other writings, it is Dillard bringing all those loose elements into a contained whole and finding her own voice to articulate the mystical process. Don't' get me wrong; I admire Annie Dillard and her style. `Pilgrim At Tinker Creek' forced me to live life, not merely exist in it and for that and her other books, I am grateful.
As an additional reader to the Dillard library I strongly recommend it. But, it is more accurate to frame it as, `Dillard: The Writer', rather than, `Dillard's Guide To Writing', or the title it now wears. By it on the former premise and you will discover much of the forming of Dillard and the natural rhythm that permeates her writing. By it on the later, as a pragmatic, `how-to' and you will know how she does it, but still be left asking a lot of the fundamental questions of `how'.

THE WRITING LIFE is the dregs of inspirational, self-absorbed, soul-cleansing books, HOW-TO-WRITE books. I'm stumped for anything positive to say about this book. Rod McKuen and his cat would like it? I can imagine Rod reading it to his mom and cat at tea. Herbal tea, no doubt. It wouldnt appeal to Norman Bates or his mother, though.

Annie Dillard lays out the challenges and aspirations of what means to live into the life of a writer with compassion and unvarnished honesty. We may take this straightforward and poetic voice with us, from the early days of our writing troughout our lives.