Righting Write
“In your lead, don’t spill the beans,”he said. "If-you do, let them be soy beans— because they are mysterious. On interviewing, get cozy ... become one with the interviewee's 'existential condition.' On writing, ‘manipulate the reader’... bring gamesmanship to your piece. Work yourself into a 'fair state of mind'... Stay low ...."
It's the first night of class at the University of Washington's Non-Fiction Writers' Program. I open the classroom door and, seemingly, enter a recurring dream I had in undergrad. I feel as though I'm in the wrong classroom, but I don't know where I'm supposed to be.