ReBlogging

I believe that all writing is rewriting–even when you’re writing something down for the first time, it’s still an act of translation in a way because you’re trying to use text to bring life to this thing that exists in your mind.

- John Green

If you randomly stumbled upon this blog or are an extraterrestrial trying to understand human writings, Rewriting by Joseph Harris is the required reading for this writing class.  The main goal of the book is to explain methods of interpreting writings and to write based off of another writing.  However before he does that, he spends an entire chapter trying to define what writing is.  One key point he makes about what writing is comes when he defines the word text.  "A book is a text, but so are movies, plays, songs... as well as objects like buildings, cars, [ect.]"  I completely agree, and writing itself plays a major part of these.  Movies and plays have scripts, songs have lyrics, and buildings and cars often start as written schematics or even a design proposal.  Writing even makes its way into places that don't seem obvious like video games (it's so not obvious that many people that make them still struggle with it).  Another point he makes is that the word interest has a lot of meanings, but most of them apply to writings.  "(1) How does this writer add interest or value to what has been said before? (2) What is [his or] her interest in this issue, what perspective is she speaking for? and (3) How is [his or] her style in writing of interest or note?"  This applies a lot to what makes a blog good or not.  Unlike a more formal publication, A blogger writes from a personal viewpoint of one person, giving it a strong interest in the issue and an interesting style.  By using hyperlinks, the blogger also gives context to what has been written before, and easily expands on it.  Blogging holds a lot of interest, and like most things, has text, making a very strong writing medium.