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Russell Baker’s text titled “On Becoming a Writer” makes many good points and has great advice mixed into his amusing and informative writing. He starts the text with a back story of how when he was growing up he wanted to become a writer but the teachers in school made the task of writing almost like torture, which I certainly agree with from my own high school writing experiences. He goes on to explain how teachers in school don’t allow for the writing experience to be fun and instead it is almost intended to be boring.
The main story told by Baker was about a writing assignment he was given in the 11th grade. He was given a list of topics; each one was followed by an even more boring topic. Like most high schoolers he procrastinated until the last minute and the night before the assignment was due he looked over the list of topics one last time and landed on the topic titled “The Art of Eating Spaghetti (83)”. As soon as he saw it, memories started coming back to him, this title produced an extraordinary sequence of mental images.
Baker then feverishly began to write about the event of him and his family gathering around and eating spaghetti at his Uncle Alan’s house. He finally found a topic he was excited about and I believe the main point he was trying to make while writing this text was that as a writer you must write about a topic that brings joy to you, because if you have no interest in writing about the given topic your apathy will be reflected in the paper.
Not only was I enjoying the story, but I also laughed out loud when Baker incorporated humor by stating, “The idea of prim Mr. Fleagle plucking his nipple from boneless gums was too much for the class” (82). I could not agree with Baker more that through high school we were assigned a topic and were not allowed to choose our own or one that interested us and so the teacher was handed papers that had no heart and it was clear to see that the writer had no interest in it.
Baker did a great job in keeping his audience (students & writers) attention and it gave the sense of why he enjoyed what he does. This made me realize that you have to enjoy what you write about and even though this assignment is about writing, I enjoyed reading the story because it really made me feel comfortable about how I really feel about writing. Reference Roen D, Glau G, Maid B. , (2010 Custom Edition) Brief McGraw-Hill Guide: Writing for College, Writing for Life On Becoming a Writer p81-83