Reading Journal #1
“A Classroom of her own” is an article about the author Danell Jones. Danell Jones is a British author who has written a book called “The Virginia Woolf Writers’ Workshop: Seven Lessons to Inspire Great Writing”. Erika Dreifus, the author of the article, had found out about this book from a friend who had a blog about “new Woolf-related books”. Dreifus goes on to explain some of the features of the book which include the seven short chapters which end with a section that Jones refers to as “writing sparks”.
At first I was a little thrown on how this paper was written. It started in the first person narrative about how Dreifus had found out about the book, but then the story proceeds in a third person informative. The entire article is about the facts of the book, how the book is formatted and gives an example from the book. Dreifus describes how Jones invented the person in her book, Virginia Woolf. “… Jones, who has been teaching writing for more than 20 years and holds a Ph.D. in English literature from Columbia University, has invented the persona of Virginia Woolf, writing instructor, and placed this character smack in front of a fictional group of aspiring writers.” Jones has created a fictional character to teach fictional people about how to write good stories or poems.
Dreifus then proceeds to describe part of the book where Jones gives an example of Virginia Woolf’s interaction with the fictional workshop participants. Dreifus quotes a section by Jones from the Chapter of “Walking”; which refers to how Woolf explains how a walk in the streets of London can help with creative writing. “I like walking the city streets, she tells them, and I like ‘walking through the long grass in the meadows, the silver sheep clustering; & the downs soaring.” This is a very descriptive section which only adds to the fact that the book is about the writing process and how Woolf’s information can help become a creative writer.
The article is then finished by explaining how the book has sections pertaining to specific writings and how society will never get to actually participate in one of Woolf’s workshops due to the fact she is a fictional person.
I felt the article jumped from one topic to another and did not have well worded transitions between the topics or ideas that Dreifus was trying to point out. Even though I felt the article jumped around, I liked the article because it did give a sample of the book. It was interesting to see a book written about a writing instructor who teaches how to write a good book or poem. This must be most difficult to do as the author of the book must already have this type of knowledge and experience in order to explain from a third person point of view.
I did not like the fact that there was not a lot of elaboration about the book. Dreifus only referred to one section of the book and I feel there should have been more information about the book or examples. In informative writing there should include details and Dreifus did include this about one chapter of Jones’ book. The article consisted of only two sections:
1. A some information on background on the author.
2. A section from the book.
I feel that the author of the article should have included one more topic to the article.
The section of the book Dreifus referred to was “Walking” and also the “writing sparks” for that section of the book. I think I would have preferred to know a little more about the book and more insight to a few more chapters. Although what Dreifus did mention seemed to very interesting there was a lot about the book and author that was not discussed. This may be a reason to hesitate in purchasing the book.