Hello, fellow writers!
I have a question for you: who do you write for when you face your computer screen?
I ask because some academic writers neglect to think much about it, unfamiliar with the value of our writing as writing. We may prioritize content over form, not giving much attention to our readers’ needs beyond providing them with useful information.
You might say that we look at them as so many cabbages.
This idea—to view an audience as a sea of cabbages—was presented to child prodigy Kató Havas when she was about to give her first violin recital at seven years old. Kató—who also became a brilliant teacher and captivating storyteller—recounted that she was puzzled by it, feeling eager to play for people in her elegant pink dress.
“So the moment I stepped on stage and heard the applause I forgot all thoughts of cabbages, and I remember to this day the face of the woman in the front row,” she recalled in her book Stage Fright (1992, xi).
(At fourteen years old it was a different story, particularly after she watched Bartók, Kodály, and other towering figures of the Hungarian musical establishment file in to the balcony at her first recital in Budapest. But I digress . . .)
I worked with Kató years ago when I was studying music performance in a conservatory-like environment and dealing with a lot of stage fright myself. Some of her stellar advice applies best to live performance.
But in the course of drafting my book, I found that her general mandate to give to your audience does translate to the writer’s life.
Stage fright in a new guise
While I was eking out my book’s first draft, I was thoroughly engrossed with teaching a heavy load at a small college where research was not really valued.
So, my days were mostly about interactions with undergrads, but like faculty members everywhere, I struggled to find compelling texts for them. When occasionally I did land on a success, it made a striking difference.
More students participated willingly in class and their performance on assignments improved.
Meanwhile, I found that it was hard not only to find time for research, but also to divide research time between keeping up with new literature in my field—especially with less-than-impressive library resources—and writing my own material.
This was a source of anxiety, especially during my first years of teaching, when I was making the Herculean effort necessary to stay viable on the academic job market—not just working on the book, but writing articles, delivering conference papers, doing service for my professional associations, and founding a new research project that could someday form the material for book number two.
I struggled with burnout and worried that I wouldn’t have enough to say to my colleagues. If I thought about my book’s readers at all, it was fearfully, imagining an amorphous body of critics.
Fortunately, Kató’s advice came back to me. Why not focus on giving to the audience at hand?
Having identified a need for academic books that can speak to undergraduates, I decided that I was going to write my book with teaching in mind. Meeting that challenge was far more useful—and interesting!—than agonizing about circumstances beyond my control.
Though I couldn’t literally see the faces of my readers as Kató could, I felt empowered with a new sense of purpose. I no longer hoped they’d turn into cabbages.
Considering readers’ needs
In making my decision, I was bolstered by reports from colleagues that they were already using one of my articles in their classrooms. But I knew that I would also need to think consciously about what would make my book more accessible.
I turned to models. One success I’d had while teaching was Matt Sakakeeny’s book Roll With It: Brass Bands in the Streets of New Orleans.
It was easy to see why students found it less daunting than other texts. Its structure privileged storytelling, with less essential historical context, lit review, and theoretical material largely tucked into endnotes.
What remained on the page seemed to benefit from Matt’s journalism background. The prose was smart but relatively simple. The book had wonderful artwork, making it a beautiful object, but it was also available as an e-book and had a helpful companion website.
I employed several of these tactics in my book project, from identifying a collaborator who could make my book visually appealing to monitoring my sentence-level complexity.
Giving to your readers
But, wait! some people might cry. As writer Sarah Menkedick wonders, isn’t this “putting the cart of the audience. . . before the horse of the idea”?
I think it’s more about being strategic in how you present your ideas.
In his book On Revision, William Germano says it well: “Give your readers what makes it possible for them to engage your ideas. Be generous. Make whatever you’re writing an opportunity for your reader, not simply an obligation, either for you or for them” (169).
It remains to be seen whether my book will be adopted as a classroom text, but keeping the goal in mind while writing was worthwhile in itself.
As I turned toward other kinds of writing—such as pitching and composing a news feature—I needed to imagine different readers and change up my writing style again.
Later, when I found myself editing music journalism while also helping an academic writer hone complex arguments in her book manuscript, I was pleased that I could flow easily between such vastly different projects, bringing the lessons learned from one realm into another.
As my friend Tony put it, I had learned to code-switch on the page, engaging in the fundamental give-and-take of writerly communication by being attuned to the needs of different readers.
I think Kató would approve.
Tell me! How do you think about your readers? I’d love to hear your stories!