{"id":41703,"date":"2024-08-31T00:01:36","date_gmt":"2024-08-31T07:01:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=41703"},"modified":"2026-06-05T10:11:34","modified_gmt":"2026-06-05T10:11:34","slug":"is-my-writing-too-nice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/is-my-writing-too-nice\/","title":{"rendered":"Is My Writing Too Nice?"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"is<\/a>
Is my writing too nice? Is my wholesome Michigan upbringing to blame? Here, my home state viewed from a NASA satellite<\/a> during the spring thaw 2019. NASA image<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Like it or not, I’m an optimist. I was either born that way or my Midwestern upbringing persuaded me to be that way.<\/p>\n

Which makes me wonder sometimes when I sit down to write, am I too much of an optimist? Too trusting? Too hopeful?<\/p>\n

Am I too danged nice in my writing — too kind to myself, too kind to my fellow humans, too sanguine about the future of the human race, given the lawlessness and civil strife in places like Haiti and Sudan?<\/p>\n

Shouldn’t I get a little angry once in a while? Do some heavy-duty, fault-finding social criticism like John Steinbeck?<\/p>\n

During the time he was preparing to write “The Grapes of Wrath,” Steinbeck wrote, “I want to put a tag of shame on the greedy bastards who are responsible for (the Depression).” And of the people who would read his book, Steinbeck declared, “I’ve done my damnedest to rip a reader’s nerves to rags.”<\/p>\n

Rip a reader’s nerves to rags? I haven’t the heart.<\/p>\n

Is My Writing Too Nice?<\/strong><\/h5>\n

Would my writing improve, on the other hand, if it were a little drearier? Emil Cioran had the downer chops to write things like, \u201cA book is a suicide postponed.\u201d I lack Cioran’s knack for pessimism.<\/p>\n

In which case, should I go for cynical like atheist Richard Dawkins, who thought, “a case can be made that faith is one of the world’s great evils, comparable to the smallpox virus but harder to eradicate.”<\/p>\n

Would it help to be scathing, like Joan Didion in her essay “Getting Serenity,” in which she skewers the folks and the stories they shared at a Gamblers Anonymous meeting in Los Angeles?<\/p>\n

If not scathing, then maybe my writing could be looser around the edges. Could I take it “On the Road” with Jack Kerouac and go crazy with sex, drugs and hellbent nonconformity?<\/p>\n

I can’t do it.<\/p>\n

Well, actually I could. I did it once. Sorta.<\/p>\n

Back in 1969, I quit my straight job in New York City, moved West, bought a pair of hippie-made leather sandals, and joined the women’s movement.<\/p>\n

It wasn’t long, though, before I’d tucked myself back into the the American dream, complete with husband, house, kids and a regular paycheck.<\/p>\n

I like my American dream. I like writing about it. I like writing about shopping for a wedding dress<\/a>\u00a0with my daughter. I like writing about refusing to sort my husband’s\u00a0socks<\/a>. I don’t have the skill set to take on Haiti or Sudan. But I can find the story in a worn out T-shirt<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"is<\/a>
I liked writing about shopping for a wedding dress with my daughter Christina. I also like taking photos of everything that happens to me and mine — that’s me in the mirror with the camera. Photo by Barbara Newhall<\/em><\/figcaption><\/figure>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\"NASA-satellite-michigan\"<\/a><\/p>\n

I sometimes wonder when I sit down to write — am I too much of an optimist? Am I too hopeful? Too trusting? Is my writing too nice?\u00a0 Read more.<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":48698,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[10,50],"tags":[134,2873,34,2874,2875,214,769,2876,82,2877,2878,2879,575],"class_list":["post-41703","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-a-case-of-the-human-condition","category-on-writing-reading","tag-books","tag-didion","tag-dont-miss","tag-kerouac","tag-literary-criticism","tag-michigan","tag-midwesterner","tag-nice","tag-on-the-funny-side","tag-optimism","tag-optimist","tag-steinbeck","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41703","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41703"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41703\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":48701,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41703\/revisions\/48701"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/48698"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41703"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41703"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41703"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}