Althouse: "You paint a pretty bleak picture of teachers as professional writers. Teaching is, after all, a 'consumptive profession,' as a friend of mine puts it..."

September 10, 2014

"You paint a pretty bleak picture of teachers as professional writers. Teaching is, after all, a 'consumptive profession,' as a friend of mine puts it..."

"... and it can be a real challenge to find the juice for our own creative endeavors after a day at school. Do you still feel that teaching full time while pursuing the writing life is a doomed proposition?" Jessica Lahey asks Stephen King, who used to teach high school.

King answers: "Many writers have to teach in order to put bread on the table. But I have no doubt teaching sucks away the creative juices and slows production. 'Doomed proposition' is too strong..."

Lahey follows up with: "If your writing had not panned out, do you think you would have continued teaching?" Answer: "Yes, but I would have gotten a degree in elementary ed.... Here’s the flat, sad truth: By the time they get to high school, a lot of these kids have already closed their minds to what we love...."

17 comments:

chillblaine said...: "Any new irksome phrases you’d be willing to share?"

'His husband,' 'her wife,' and 'of course,' make my list.

This is a delicious article.; 9/10/14, 9:47 AM
James Pawlak said...: The essential problem is that so few of today's teachers have a useful knowledge of what was once called "Rhetoric"--Which include some meaningful command of our language and of logic (And avoidance of logical/thinking errors, for which see).; 9/10/14, 9:48 AM
rhhardin said...: Roethke did okay.

His "Last Class" on the idiocy of his students and fellow faculty is a classic.; 9/10/14, 10:00 AM
rhhardin said...: Here's Last Class less a couple pages, thanks to google books.; 9/10/14, 10:06 AM
Larry J said...: "Yes, but I would have gotten a degree in elementary ed.... Here’s the flat, sad truth: By the time they get to high school, a lot of these kids have already closed their minds to what we love...."

By the time they've reached high school, they've been exposed to so many bad teachers that they are just doing time until dropping out or getting a meaningless piece of paper.

Back in the early 1980s, I was a math major in college who decided to become a teacher. That meant having to take the obligatory and useless education classes. I recall discussing math with one of my clasmates, an aspiring elementary education teacher. I asked her how many math course she'd taken and she said, "I hate math! I take just the absolute minimum."

Wonderful. No matter how much she tried to smile when math time comes, the kids will pick up on her dislike of (and ignorance of) math. What kind of attitude or aptitude will those kids carry forward through their years in school?

I ended up teaching for a year before deciding that the BS to Benefit Ratio was too poor to continue. Funny thing, though, is that I enjoyed teaching most of the time but there was a lot of BS and very little benefit.; 9/10/14, 10:10 AM
Achilles said...: You mean the college major with the lowest academic rigor and standardized test score achievement produces writers that generally suck and lean left?

Shocked I am.; 9/10/14, 10:11 AM
Now is the winter of our discontent made glorious summer by this son of New York said...: Achilles,
There has to be someplace where people who can't make it as journalists go.; 9/10/14, 10:29 AM
chillblaine said...: Thanks rhhardin! Reading your link makes me want to maybe, just maybe, dip my dessicated toe back into fiction.; 9/10/14, 10:41 AM
ken in tx said...: Teaching is a performance art, like acting or standup. Except you are expected to write your own lines and rehearse on your own time. So called prep periods are taken up with parent conferences and administrative meetings. You are on stage six hours a day, five days a week for 180 days a year, frequently with a hostile audience, including hecklers. Your so-called Summer off is spent taking classes to keep your certificate up to date.
If you have time to write professionally after that, you are not taking your teaching seriously.; 9/10/14, 12:28 PM
Robert Cook said...: Given how invaluable a service teachers provide, perhaps brighter, more motivated, better qualified young adults would consider teaching as a career if the pay and benefits were better.

I know it may shock those here who perceive of teachers as scam artists and/or union bullies getting rich with minimal investment of their time and effort in cushy jobs and who jet off to the south seas each summer...but that is not the case.

Of course, those here who perceive of teachers in such a way also assume teachers set the agenda for the class lessons and are therefore responsible for children being poorly educated and/or inculcated with leftist propaganda. In fact, the local school boards set the agendas for their schools, and teachers are slaves to the dictates and pedagogical philosophies of the school boards.; 9/10/14, 12:33 PM
Michael K said...: "I enjoyed teaching most of the time but there was a lot of BS and very little benefit."

There was a time when I had plans to move to Vashon Island in Puget Sound. I thought it might be fun to teach biology at the high school there but I started to find out about the license requirements and gave up. I didn't move there anyway but I had property there for ten years.; 9/10/14, 1:29 PM
Kevin said...: This topic always brings to mind this classic from Family Guy: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTSGp4UdEvQ; 9/10/14, 1:30 PM
Todd said...: Robert Cook said...
Given how invaluable a service teachers provide, perhaps brighter, more motivated, better qualified young adults would consider teaching as a career if the pay and benefits were better.

Funny thing is, we are not short teachers. We are short good teachers. With the current organizations in place, how will raising pay attract better teachers when bad ones are currently doing just fine? Won't we just attract more bad teachers? Or are you assuming that better pay would make some better teachers stick around and put up with the unions, the rest of the Ed bureaucracy and the large group of bad teachers with seniority because the pay will be worth it?; 9/10/14, 2:13 PM
theo said...: Considering the quality of Mr King's more recent work perhaps he should go back to teaching.; 9/10/14, 2:21 PM
Beloved Commenter AReasonableMan said...: Robert Cook said...
In fact, the local school boards set the agendas for their schools, and teachers are slaves to the dictates and pedagogical philosophies of the school boards.

And the members of the school boards are as dumb as rocks.; 9/10/14, 7:51 PM
SGT Ted said...: And the members of the school boards are as dumb as rocks

Considering the unthinking, doctrinaire leftism that is shot through the teaching profession, teachers are as dumb as rocks as well.

In fact, the local school boards set the agendas for their schools, and teachers are slaves to the dictates and pedagogical philosophies of the school boards.

But, the union authoritarianism is just fine.

I find it hilarious that, while the local schoolboard is suspect of providing any sort of competent guidance, we are to trust a pack of ignoramuses in DC, steeped in the same progressive authoritarian idiocy, with our healthcare and everything else under the sun.; 9/11/14, 9:35 AM
Freeman Hunt said...: "Yes, but I would have gotten a degree in elementary ed.... Here’s the flat, sad truth: By the time they get to high school, a lot of these kids have already closed their minds to what we love...."

Maybe there's something to that. I'm teaching a small writing class for students in third through sixth grades. It is a magical age. They are creative and intelligent and not yet jaded or too distracted by hormones.; 9/11/14, 10:40 AM