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Writing is like Plate Spinning

April 6, 2013/0 Comments/in Writing is Like, Writing Lesson/by Katherine Cowley

This is a metaphor that I’m borrowing from mystery writer Michael Connelly. He writes: From somewhere in my memory, either amateur hour TV or the boardwalk in Venice, I remember a sideshow act called plate spinning. The object of this entertainment endeavor is to rotate plates balanced on thin wooden dowels. The practitioner gets several […]

Everyday Rhetoric

March 28, 2013/0 Comments/in Writing Lesson/by Katherine Cowley

A lot of times, rhetoric is taught in college with the immediate purpose of helping students become better at writing college papers. But what I love about rhetoric is it’s everyday, normal uses. When we first moved into this apartment, my daughter’s door would jam, and sometimes I would have a really hard time opening […]

Writing is like Plate Spinning

April 6, 2013/0 Comments/in Writing is Like, Writing Lesson/by Katherine Cowley

Everyday Rhetoric

March 28, 2013/0 Comments/in Writing Lesson/by Katherine Cowley

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Writing is like Plate Spinning

April 6, 2013/0 Comments/in Writing is Like, Writing Lesson/by Katherine Cowley

This is a metaphor that I’m borrowing from mystery writer Michael Connelly. He writes:

From somewhere in my memory, either amateur hour TV or the boardwalk in Venice, I remember a sideshow act called plate spinning. The object of this entertainment endeavor is to rotate plates balanced on thin wooden dowels. The practitioner gets several pieces of supposedly good china spinning at once and then must quickly move from dowel to dowel, keeping everything spinning and aloft. Paid particular attention is the plate in the middle of the formation. By virtue of its position, it is the most important of the plates. If it goes down, it invariably takes several other plates with it and you have broken china all over the ground and an empty tip bucket.

In my mind I often liken writing a book to spinning plates. There are many, many different things you have to keep up and spinning at all times.

Connelly describes some of the plates that you keep spinning when you write a novel, include story structure, writing style, pacing, and background research. For him, the central plate is characterization: if that plate falls, all the other plates are going to fall with it.

If you’re writing an argument, the plates you’re spinning will include ethos, pathos, and logos, your reasons and supporting evidence, your style, your awareness of the audience, and many other things. To me, the central plate is your main overriding claim or your thesis–if it topples or loses focus, there goes your entire argument.

Here’s an awesome video of plate spinning, a little different from the show Connelly saw, but quite impressive. This is from a Beijing Acrobat show:

Make sure to check out my Metaphors about Writing page for quotes on writing and other Writing is like… posts.

Photo Credit: lissalou66, Creative Commons license

The quote by Michael Connelly is from a book chapter called “Characterization,” in the book Writing Mysteries: A Handbook by the Mystery Writers of America (edited by Sue Grafton). See page 57.

Everyday Rhetoric

March 28, 2013/0 Comments/in Writing Lesson/by Katherine Cowley

A lot of times, rhetoric is taught in college with the immediate purpose of helping students become better at writing college papers.

But what I love about rhetoric is it’s everyday, normal uses.

When we first moved into this apartment, my daughter’s door would jam, and sometimes I would have a really hard time opening it. Twice I couldn’t open it at all and had to have my husband do it.

Maintenance said they couldn’t fix it, and that it was normal for the doors to jam. Something to do with air pressure and humidity, ya dah ya dah ya dah.

So I thought, what is the strongest possible reason I can make for why my daughter’s door needs to be fixed? The fact that it was annoying, irritating, or challenging was obviously not good enough.

I told the office that I was worried about it being a fire hazard: what if there was a fire and I couldn’t get the door opened because it was jammed?

Within an hour, my daughter’s door was fixed.

Now fast forward. Several weeks ago, I put in a work order for maintenance to fix a number of small, yet irritating things. Like my towel rack. I like to hang up my towel. Yet for some reason or another, my request got lost in the shuffle.

One of the things on the list was switching the air filter (the office had said maintenance could do it the first time so I could see how it was done). So this morning, I removed the 20 inch by 20 inch air filter from the ceiling vent. It was one of the filthiest things I have ever seen. I brought my baby, my toddler, and the filthy air filter to the main office.

Within an hour, everything on my list had been fixed.

I intentionally didn’t bring the baby backpack, a stroller, or anything that would have made my trip easier. That would have damaged the visual impact. The office assistant said, “You know you can just throw that air filter away.” What I didn’t tell her is that I knew I could just go to the office and they’d give me a new air filter, but I had brought the old one with me because I wanted all my maintenance requests to be fixed.

And it worked.

And that’s why I love rhetoric. As Aristotle wrote, rhetoric is using “the available means of persuasion.” It’s not just about getting an A on a college paper–though rhetoric can certainly help you do that as well. It’s about using your voice to make changes in the world, particularly when they’re not changes you can make on your own.

Photo Credits:

Pen and paper by Guudmorning!
Dirty air filter by AJC1