A prolific painter of portraits before and after the French Revolution ...

ch07.qxd 12/2/04 11:59 AM Page 337
explaining:
the writing process
337
in a crowd of about 250,000 traveling in an antique open car moving
ver-r-ry slowly. At that time in the series I was involved with a character
named Nick. Some man broke through, came right up to the car and said
to me, ‘Why don’t you give me a little bit of what you’ve been giving Nick?’
” The man hung onto the car, menacingly, until she was rescued by the police.
Another time, when she was in church, the reverent silence was broken
by a woman’s astonished remark, “Oh, my god, Erica prays!” Margaret
Mason, who plays the villainous Lisa Anderson in “Days of Our Lives,”
was accosted by a woman who poured a carton of milk all over her in the
supermarket. And once a woman actually tried to force her car off the Ventura
Freeway.
V OICE AND T ONE Writers also use voice and tone to shape and control whole
passages, often in combination with other shaping strategies. In the following paragraph,
Toni Bambara, author of The Salt Eaters and numerous short stories, explains
what being a writer is all about. This paragraph is shaped both by a single extended
example and by Bambara’s voice talking directly to the reader:
When I replay the tapes on file in my head, tapes of speeches I’ve given at
writing conferences over the years, I invariably hear myself saying—“A
writer, like any other cultural worker, like any other member of the community,
ought to try to put her/his skills in the service of the community.”
Some years ago when I returned south, my picture in the paper prompted
several neighbors to come visit. “You a writer? What all you write?” Before
I could begin the catalogue, one old gent interrupted with—“Ya know Miz
Mary down the block? She need a writer to help her send off a letter to her
grandson overseas.” So I began a career as the neighborhood scribe—letters
to relatives, snarling letters to the traffic chief about the promised stop
sign, nasty letters to the utilities, angry letters to the principal about that
confederate flag hanging in front of the school, contracts to transfer a truck
from seller to buyer, etc. While my efforts have been graciously appreciated
in the form of sweet potato dumplings, herb teas, hair braiding, and the
like, there is still much room for improvement—“For a writer, honey, you’ve
got a mighty bad hand. Didn’t they teach penmanship at that college?” Another
example, I guess, of words setting things in motion. What goes
around, comes around, as the elders say.
C HRONOLOGICAL O RDER AND P ROCESS A NALYSIS Writers use
chronological order in expository writing to help explain how to do something or how
PROFESSIONAL COPY—NOT FOR RESALE