Grub Street Responses

February 11th



New Grub Street



1. I can definitely relate to Reardon when he says that he has padded material. There have been times when I have been required to write six page papers on topics that only merit four pages or when I was given the challenge of meeting very long length requirements that I have padded my writing. I think that the most common way for me to pad writing would be to add in another long quote from a passage or reading. By adding in a quote it makes it seem like you are expanding on what you were talking about rather than just "trying to take up room". I have mixed emotions about length requirements in papers. I think that professors should trust us enough to know that we will not turn in one page for something that should be a research paper. If you are given a topic and say everything that you feel you should and need to say then however long the paper is at that point, is how long it should be. I think that you should be given the right to stop writing when you are through and writing length requirements should not exist.



Virtual Grub Street



1. I read an encyclopedia passage about Ernest Hemingway to analyze the prose. What I found is that the encyclopedia seemed to be written in a very boring fashion. The online prose seemed to be very fact based and just listed off a series of events that happened in chronological order. To be honest I have not used a real encyclopedia in so long that I do not remember the usual prose of the work. I do happen to agree with the author that only writing can be superficial and bland. But, I also acknowledge that written works can be just as bland and boring.

4.I think his complaint is valid. I think that lots of other people would agree with his perspective especially those who may be considered digital immigrants. Those who would be considered immigrants might also feel that multimedia writing is not for them. I think that older souls would definitely not want to expand and learn the new technologies. I think that lots of people would consider the writing on the Internet to be much more bland. Writing that is published on the Internet does not use the rhetoric that Shakespeare or a classic novel did. I think he has a real reason for his theory and it is not just a personal claim