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ideas must be present at the outset. On the old television series The Odd Couple , Felix the photographer thinks he might like to try his hand at writing, and so follows Oscar the sportswriter around, taking notes on what he does. Oscar sits motionless at the typewriter and looks heavenward. Felix asks him what he is doing. “I’m thinking of stuff to write,” Oscar barks with impatience. “Ah!” says Felix, intrigued, and dutifully jots a note to himself: “Think of stuff to write.” Now that is a rather profound summary of the process. The thinking part of writing is often overlooked. I would be very pleased to have that as an epitaph: HE THOUGHT OF STUFF TO WRITE.
    I had been looking off into the professorial middle distance, strolling around the room and not making eye contact. Now I looked closely at the class. They were with me. They had felt, in some form or another, what I was talking about. My tattooed woman dug into the flesh of her hands with her thumbnails. Her eyes didn’t leave me. She wore an expression of wonderment. I felt very powerful.
    I pressed on. Writing is difficult because we don’t even call it what it is. The writing, the recording, the typing, whatever, is the least crucial part. Writing is thinking and crafting and editing; unfortunately, the writer always desires to make progress, and without constant vigilance may slip out of thinking and crafting mode and into mere progress, which can signal doom.
    Writing is difficult because it seems so useless. One cannot imagine one’s writing having the smallest impact on the world. And is there any process that calls for more self-discipline to get it right with less potential payoff?
    Gore Vidal said it well. “The phrase that sounds in the head changes when it appears on the page. Then I start probing it with a pen, finding new meanings. Sometimes I burst out laughing at what is happening as I twist and turn sentences. Strange business, all in all. One never gets to the end of it. That’s why I go on, I suppose. To see what the next sentences I write will be.” 1
    E. B. White said that, when writing, he had “occasionally had the exquisite thrill of putting my finger on a little capsule of truth, and heard it give the faint squeak of mortality under my pressure, an antic sound.” 2
    Both writers manage to convey how the act of writing can seem like the pastime of a lunatic.
    Writing is difficult because sometimes as we write we are forced to confront the shattering reality, about midway through composition, that no part of what we are saying is true. Writing, often inconveniently, reveals truth. The composition of an essay advocating a position may reveal to the writer that he believes the exact opposite. What could be more demoralizing? The honest writer, upon seeing that the piece will not move forward, chucks out everything and begins afresh, which requires copious amounts of moral fiber. Writing assignments require honesty and fortitude in a way that chemistry homework doesn’t.
    Writing is difficult because it is so fraught; we know that we will be judged as people by the work we present. Math, even badly done math, is more neutral. As a friend of mine said after watching a comedian who failed to amuse him, “You never say, ‘Hey, what a bad comedian!’ You say, ‘Hey, what an asshole!’ ” Writers are in the same fix. We are judged as human beings by our writing, but how difficult is it for us to convey in writing the depth and subtlety of our minds? How often do we receive an e-mail at work that portrays the writer as completely different (and not in a positive way) from the person we know so well? It’s a writing issue. At the wedding, the sozzled best man, normally a considerate chap, manages with his toast to the bride and groom to embarrass every last person in the tent. It’s a writing issue. The man disappoints because his prose does.
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