Reflection's Edge

Book Review: Writing Down the Bones by Natalie Goldberg

by staff

Natalie Goldberg’s book Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writing Within has sold over one million copies, has been translated into ten languages and is credited - not always positively - with popularizing informal writing workshops/circles and encouraging all people, whether or not they think of themselves as professionals, to write. Since the 1986 release of Writing Down the Bones, Goldberg has gone on to write seven more books about the Zen of writing, and has spawned a cottage industry of similar "how to" books.

Perhaps it’s easiest to see what Writing Down the Bones is not: a book about how to get published. None of the chapter headings mention editors, agents, publishers, or marketing techniques. There is nothing about whether it is better to get an agent or a publishing contract first, how to write a query letter, whether you should type doublespaced, or whether you really have to send a self-addressed stamped envelope. Nor is it about how you can get into a writing program, or earn a writing grant.

Instead, Writing Down the Bones starts with a beginning class: what pen to choose (Goldberg reccomends cheap fountain pens - you can write quickly with them, and you don't have to panic if you break them), and the advantages of notebooks with funny covers. This light-hearted beginning introduces the Zen concept of “beginner’s mind" - a mind empty of prejudices and preconceptions about what it means to be a "serious writer." Throughout the book, "beginner's mind" is tied to and influences Goldberg’s concept of "beginning writer" and "beginning to write."

Goldberg’s aesthetics can be summed up in one moment of realization:

One day I was cooking ratatouille, and I was cutting up eggplant and onions all day. At the end of the day, I went to the bookstore and I saw a thin volume of poetry by Erica Jong called Fruits and Vegetables. The first poem I read was about cooking an onion. I didn't know you could write a poem about something that ordinary. It was what I'd been doing all day. And with that, I was ready.

Goldberg’s focus on the everyday, the ordinary, as a vehicle for transcendence is very much a part of Zen. Goldberg introduced the term "writing practice" - writing as a form of Zen meditation. Famously, Katagiri Roshi, Goldberg’s Zen teacher, told her to make writing her practice. At the time, Goldberg thought he was telling her she wasn’t good enough to sit Zen, but when she asked him, decades later, why he had given her that advice, he replied: "You seemed to like writing."

It’s not likely that if you read Writing Down the Bones, you will become a disciple of Zen, but as Goldberg writes: "What is said here about writing can be applied to running, painting, anything you love and have chosen to work with in your life." Goldberg’s point is that nearly anything can be made a "practice" - writing, running, painting, business. This approach informs every page of her book on writing, and makes it accessible even to those who don't think of themselves as writers.

There are over fifty chapters in Writing Down the Bones, most of them very short - 2 to 3 printed pages in an oversized paperback. Many chapters contain excerpts from poems, samples of writing from students, or quotations from famous writers. Although Writing Down the Bones is not structured as a series of writing exercises, each chapter often ends with an imperative - about seeing, feeling, doing.

Throughout, Goldberg’s tone is fiercely colloquial - often the chapters sound like transcribed lectures, or notes for lectures. This informality helps her push home her main point: the importance of the act of writing itself. Goldberg talks about the importance of sitting down with a notebook and pen (or a computer keyboard) and freeing ourselves into feeling able to write as we want. This makes Writing Down the Bones a powerful tool for authors beset by writer's block.

Many of the concepts we now associate with books on writing originated in Writing Down the Bones - small, informal writing workshops or circles; the act of writing as an end in itself, independent of publishing and professional status; writing in cafes; writing with a partner; writing for timed periods; speed writing; and writing about a topic for five or ten minutes.

Whether or not you agree with Goldberg's approach to writing, Writing Down the Bones is essential to understanding recent writer's movements. Because it takes a philosophical rather than practical approach to writing, it makes an excellent gift for anyone interested in writing, regardless of preferred genre or level of experience.

If you liked this book, you may also enjoy:

Wild Mind: Living the Writer's Life, by Natalie Goldberg

The Artist's Way: A Spiritual Path to Higher Creativity, by Julia Cameron

Bird by Bird : Some Instructions on Writing and Life, by Anne Lamott

The Empty Space : A Book About the Theatre: Deadly, Holy, Rough, Immediate, by Peter Brook

Goldberg's website: www.nataliegoldberg.com

An Interview with Natalie Goldberg on SoundsTrue.com



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