Monday, November 9, 2009
"I can't go on, I'll go on."
-Samuel Beckett, The Unnameable
Although I did manage to get a bit of writing done each day this weekend, I still have another day or so's worth of work left in front of me before I finish the draft of my Afterword. This, in itself, is not an especially big deal, but I have to admit I am somewhat less than satisfied with what I have written thus far, which makes it considerably more difficult for me to soldier on. But I have to. And I will.
For tomorrow: Prep for the final bit of the Afterword.
Labels: Dissertation, fatigue, frustration
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Friday, August 28, 2009
I think writing the last chapter on
Disgrace took more out of me than I had initially assumed. I mean, I knew was more ragged around the edges that I had been in some time, but
wow: the past few days I have been trying to work on an academic side project, as I do from time to time, and I have been positively miserable. Like a petulant child, I feel like stomping my feet and shouting
I doan' wanna! at the top of my lungs every time I look at the screen. I have made some headway with the project, but I wish I had more patience than I do at the moment. Instead of taking my time, calmly working my way through it, I just want to be done with it. Since it took me such a long time to complete the last chapter, I did not really have much of a summer vacation and, with school starting very soon, I suppose part of my difficulty stems from the fact that I want to enjoy a break before resuming my teaching duties. Thus, there's some misplaced resentment aimed at what is, actually, a very nice project to be working on. The timing is just terrible. But that's grad school sometimes. You work until you cannot work any more, then you work some more. Then school starts and you work even more and, somehow, you make progress. That's what I have got to remember: you either do or you do not do and you can only complain if you do do. And, believe me, I intend to enjoy the privilege :)
Now, before I hit the hay, I'm going to do a bit of work and try to read a few pages of Slow Man.
For tomorrow: Read.
Labels: Dissertation, fatigue, frustration
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Thursday, January 29, 2009
So, I'm still working on reviewing my notes from the criticism I spent half a year reading. As has been the case with every part of the
Disgrace chapter, this has taken me several times longer than I had anticipated to get through. I should finish within the next week or so, leaving me with the still daunting task of attempting to arrange all this stuff into a readable chapter on the novel. I have to admit that, at times, this chapter feels so big that it almost seems un-startable. I say
almost because, fuck it all, I'm gonna get this damn thing done. I am still debating with myself over how I am going to proceed with the outlining phase, whether I will need to re-organize the re-read notes into more user-friendly thematic bites or if I am going to outline the chapter first, then arrange the notes. Although I initially thought I would arrange the notes first, I am leaning towards the latter approach because it will enable me to foreground my own logic in the structuring of the chapter. Then, as I re-arrange the notes, the writing process will, essentially, be underway. I will have, after all,
started saying what's been pent up for so long.
Soundtrack for the past week: Big Black's Songs About Fucking.
For the next little while: Keep reading over the notes and working on the bibliography.
Labels: Big Black, Dissertation, dissertation anxiety, frustration
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