237: Bird by Bird
📚 Book Report: Anne Lamott knows why we write + City of Signs
The books which matter to me are the ones in which I get a keener glimpse of myself.
“Left to its own devices, my mind spends much of its time having conversations with people who aren’t there. I walk along defending myself to people, or exchanging repartee with them, or rationalizing my behavior, or seducing them with gossip, or pretending I’m on their TV show or whatever.” -Anne Lamott
I’m not a “seduce my invisible conversationalist with gossip” person, but everything else about that quote rings true. I have turned to Anne Lamott’s Bird by Bird (Amazon, Goodreads) so often, in so many contexts, Claude is pretty sure she’s my most-cited author.
For good reason.
First published in 1994, Bird by Bird has never been out of print – which is saying something for its continued relevance. It is, for many of us who’ve taught creativity, a foundational tome. Bird by Bird works a weird magic found with less potency in King, Ueland, or McPhee – who’s strengths lie elsewhere. Lamott’s is an unfamiliar candor. Where books on writing can be frustratingly confident beyond words, the Lamott in Bird by Bird is willing to reveal herself far from solid land, seemingly as adrift as her students. Which is why I sense it is so prescribed in freshman writing.
“Writing is so often about making mistakes and feeling lost.” -Anne Lamott
Those practicing the business of ideas benefit from Lamott because she’s articulated the relationship between creative people and uncertainty. The work of the designer, the art director, the writer is more or less that which can’t be specified in advance. It is the craft of knowing what to do without knowing how it ends. The book serves as a talisman, a permission ritual when the stakes is high. Lamott’s actual subject is the maintenance of the idea person’s only capital equipment – their own nervous system. Her work services the operator, versus the regimen of distinct skills.
“Writing is about hypnotizing yourself into believing in yourself, getting some work done, then unhypnotizing yourself and going over the material coldly.” - Anne Lamott
All the more reason for Bird by Bird’s educational value in the age of AI. Because if technology can commoditize skills, what remains for humans are those messy operations – deciding what’s worth making, tolerating the ugly middle, paying a particular attention. City University of New York professor Briallen Hopper, on reassessing Bird by Bird in The New Republic, puts it this way:
“As writing becomes increasingly automated, the inefficient, irreplaceable human practice of writing is arguably becoming ever more precious.” -Briallen Hopper
We should aspire to inefficient preciousness more often.
We should take more of the risks associated with uncertain, pregnant unknowns.
We should stare at the wall or our shoes or out the window, exchanging repartee with people who aren’t there.
And then reach for the keyboard.
“Writing can be a pretty desperate endeavor, because it is about some of our deepest needs: our need to be visible, to be heard, our need to make sense of our lives, to wake up and grow and belong. It is no wonder if we sometimes tend to take ourselves perhaps a bit too seriously.” -Anne Lamott
It’s quite a trick to have turned words into a lasting mirror for so many.
And in so doing, hold our hands down the lonely path.
Thanks, Anne.
Good thing Lamott isn’t a recluse, or shy.
If ink and pulp aren’t your preferred delivery method, you can intake Bird by Bird through many other channels. A favorite:
Addendum: City of Signs
Thanks, Rick, for pointing me to this meticulous and delightful homage to current day, hand-made retail signage in New York City. The story of Noble Signs might be the best 26 minutes you spend all day.