The thing about unformulated, incoherent, insubstantial thoughts is that they are too raw for the eyes of 'professional' readers. This is why we edit, proof read, proof read some more, lose our sanities at 4:00 a.m. trying to finish that last paragraph for that last essay of the term. How on earth do people get the inspiration and the motivation to continue writing like maniacs with sheer elegance in those last coffee-driven minutes, is beyond me. Landing with an A+ paper at that, merely blow my mind. But, the truth is, the longer I stay in school, the more concise and coherent my thought and language becomes... well, isn't that a bunch of crap! I admit that it helps, sure, as does living and working in the 'real' world, apart from the academic helps to sustain oneself. My dad knew a man who had dropped out of school in Grade 10, started his own company and then was recruited by my dad's to become the PR manager. I have met him personally and to be honest, I can't tell whether he had ever been to school or whether he's just faking the whole British accent and polished statements. I have read his emails to my dad and really this man is a stroke of genius. His elegance and style may have come from the bucket-loads of experience that he had working post-dropping out, but he did it. He nailed the 'pure' thought process.
Of course, I might discredit his work by claiming that he is just one example and most of us need to go into university or college to get the clarity in our writing and in our speech. Let's be honest with ourselves, at least those studying English in University, we know some of the writers we read and analyze in class were some very unclassy folks who probably never went to school or even if they did, they had minimal education. Their works had the kind of 'raw' that our works lack. Maybe that's the problem with the University structure: discrediting originality of thought, aiming for a robotic understanding of the texts through essay-writing and draining out creativity is the way to go. Perhaps, this makes it slightly easier in the marking? But even then, style and subjectivity of the reader either allows for a subjective A+ or a subjective C-. Perhaps a little more creativity, some more thought, a little more KABAM! in everyone's work can give these mundane tasks a brighter end. But, of course, this whole rant won't be taken seriously unless I had a Ph. D to my title about the ways in which 'Dynamic ways of teaching help improve the creative part of a person's brain' (adding a whole bunch of complicated psychological terminology combined with it's effects on the sociological structuring of the university education).
All I know, is that some of the articles we read in newspapers come from students who have graduated from English undergrad degrees, Journalism undergrad degrees, and so on and so forth. We may take their statements with a grain of salt, but I don't see why we would question it beyond necessary, since we hardly have the time or the energy to spend doing so.
--- 'In science there is a dictum: don't add an experiment to an experiment. Don't make things unnecessarily complicated. In writing fiction, the more fantastic the tale, the plainer the prose should be. Don't ask your readers to admire your words when you want them to believe your story.' Ben Bova
XOXO
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