Foxed by thought
Ms P and Mr R have got me thinking about my theory of good writing. My problem is, I don’t have one. I understand the idea that there is bad writing and I certainly know the experience of reading writing which is good, but I’ve never really been comfortable with the idea of being able to define it. I am, in this instance, a relativist, which means that I don’t believe that there is any such thing as “perfect” writing nor that there is some way of making irrefutable judgements about the quality of writing. I’m not sure if my students should be pleased by this declaration or not. On the one hand, I don’t claim to have the knowledge to make final judgements about their writing so they can feel more comfortable to explore and experiment without fear of too harsh a judgement. On the other hand, they don’t have a teacher who feels able to point them towards perfection with any degree of confidence. Whilst I appreciate that writing is a discipline and that there are very defini...