Elbow’s remarks about writing being “the culprit in drowning out felt sense” really struck me, making me think of so, so many tutoring sessions I’ve had. Getting them to take a moment to think, to consider, to feel before scribbling out the sentence that they’ve deemed “wrong,” is exceptionally difficult, as is asking them to “blurt” (to use Nolan’s term) their ideas on the page (since so many of them see tutoring as an opportunity for editing services). When they’re having one of these moments, I often ask them to speak what they’d like to write/what they’re trying to say. It is amazing how much clearer their thoughts appear before them when they allow themselves to simply communicate without taking the time to worry about their sentence structure.
