JUST. LET. ME. WRITE! (Blogpost 6)

All English majors should read The Anonymous Lady’s “On Being Charged with Writing Incorrectly”! Trust me, you will relate to her argument. Okay, so maybe not all English majors will relate to her argument, but most will.

What constitutes “correct” writing? Does the answer lie within the grammaticism? Is the answer found in the word choice and style? Can the answer be found in correct punctuation, excellent examples, and vivid imagery? For some, the answer to these questions, and others of this same nature would be a resounding “yes”. However, for the Anonymous Lady (a.k.a. the Amorous Lady), the answer would, indefinitely, be “no”.

The Anonymous Lady published poems which were included in “The Barbados Gazette”. Very little is known about her, hence the name, but what scholars have gathered is that she was probably a well-known London poet whose work was prevalent during the 1720’s. Her poetry challenged the restrictions placed on her by male writers and in her works, she argued against conventions.

Thus, if she were to hear someone state that correct writing is comprised of all the conventions that are commonly associated, she would argue the opposite. In her poem “On Being Charged with Writing Incorrectly”, she challenges this idea by calling attention to the importance of rejecting these unmerited limitations in writing. She states, “the learned say / That I write well, but not their way”. She realizes that her work is rejected by some of her counterparts because she has chosen to write contrary to what was thought of as “correct” during that time.

Well, what was her preferred way of writing? Great question! She allows her genius to do its own thing. She lets her genius “have its way” and states that she will still obey her genius, rather than obey conventional rules. She values writing in whatever form is suitable and comfortable to her, not according to the critics “stupid rules” that attempt to put her in an inescapable box. She allows whatever is in her soul to flow outward.

She despises the “mighty dull […] mighty wise” writers of her time and state that they “pant and struggle for a name”. This could be because they are preoccupied with trying to write like others that they struggle to build a credible reputation for themselves. She mentions Busby’s students as refers to them as his slaves who “learned their methods from his nod”. Busby was a teacher at Westminster who used a rod to correct his students, especially those with which he did not agree. The Anonymous Lady claims that the students learned to fear Busby’s nod and conform to his way of writing so that they would receive his nod of approval.

Because she writes from the soul, her thoughts are not regarding all the superficial rules that accompany “correct” writing. She states, “[w]ith transport I the pen employ / And every line reveals my joy. / No pangs of thought I undergo, / My words descend, my numbers flow”. She has mastered writing from the soul, a skill which her counterparts lack and, thus, criticize her for having. This is another reason she despises the mighty dull and mighty wise. Though they may, indeed, be wise, their works are dull, in her opinion, because they have not learned to free their souls when writing.

As an English major, I could relate to her argument that we should write from the soul. This semester, I have reached that point in my college tenure that I have had serious doubts concerning choosing English as my major. I am not saying that I do not love English as a field of study, I just do not love the assignments that accompany this major. Many of the essays and writing assignments are so constrained that writing from the soul is a major way to get point deductions. I have had MLA, with which I have a love-hate relationship – but that is for another blog post, shoved down my throat since middle school.

If I do not follow the guidelines and the limitations of MLA in my writing, points are deducted. If I do not have excellent sources to back up my claims, points are deducted. I feel as though the creativity that comes with writing is being backed into a corner and pulverized by MLA, rubric guidelines, and other means of standardization and when a person deviates from the standardization, he or she is not encouraged to continue, but are reprimanded based on the range of the deviation.

Simply put, the Anonymous Lady’s point was just let me write and my point is the same. JUST. LET. ME. WRITE!