Melissa's "Book of Mark"-Memories of Spring 2004

A couple weeks back, I spent some time perusing the Wikis listed on my sidebar, as well as the English Methods Wiki for the course I will take this fall. I came upon Melissa Bartlett's page entitled TheBookOfMark. I was reminded of the portfolio she did for Writing for Secondary Teachers, which was an earlier version of the quote log. Some of these quotes impart wisdom, others are just plain hilarious

I've copied and pasted it below in case the wiki disappears before this blog...too priceless to lose.
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Mark Christensen Quote Log
5 March 1996 – Present

“Being a poet is a habit of attention.”

“In poetry you control where the line ends.”

“. . . control (influence/affect) your future self.”

“Use something you’ve overheard by someone else.”

“How much of you is your body?"

“Increased consciousness of the stuff you identify with equals increased consciousness of your identity.”

“How you see the world is your choice.”

“You can’t describe an object without describing you, in a way.”

“How much of ourselves do we give other people?”

“Poetry equals the tension between living internally and materially in things.”

“There is no reason for us to settle for boredom.”

“Stuckness is pessimistic.”

“Sometimes it’s really hard to be the one who watches.”

“Remember a person who hasn’t been as lucky as I am. . . a profound difference of perception.”

“Try to merge with –23 degree weather.”

“Eliminate vision to heighten it.”

“Being a writer is a state of mind.”

“I like it when something just pops out.”

‘Writer’s mode is ‘you are free to choose.’”

“Be quiet as strangely as you can.”

“Why are you doing that?!?”

“Just let one strike you.”

“I wonder how you see light.”

“Let them fall out – think about that for awhile.”

“Try to get yourself out of yourself.”

“What does it feel like to write a poem?

“. . . pushing yourself over the edge to make sure you’re still there.”

“I want to be in your brain now.”

“Searching for the right word to match the proverbial image. . . “

--- “Most people who are taught writing are taught in building blocks.”

“The only thing linear is time.”

“It’s not enough to be a ‘conventional’ good writer.”

“Don’t write things you don’t want me to know.”

“High school students are intellectually competent.”

“In your teaching lives you’re going to have to live with the fact that no one else will ever know what you’re doing . . it’s just one long set of stories that will die along with you.”

“We use writing to get business done.”

“Writing is a means of thinking.”

“When did I ever have the balls to show anybody else this crap?”

“Teaching writing is the greatest gift you can give someone.”

“Writing’s reward is in the doing of it.”

“Society’s lost the sense of doing something for it’s own end.”

“Life isn’t for schooling, schooling is for life.”

“Learning is the natural human condition.”

“Great teachers use their own demons productively.”

“Great teachers commonly relish their environments.”

“There is nothing more intimate than a person’s language.”

“Be open to find out stuff about students as they choose to reveal it.”

"They may progress, but it may be in spite of you."

“I know that there will be oddballs like you.”

“You are weirdos as far as the rest of the world goes.”

“Surface features are not to be ignored, but he does think that they are tinkerable. To tinker means, something already exists and you adjust. When you're done adjusting, and you have opportunity to adjust, uh, you've cleaned, polished that surface, and so that isn't any longer an issue, and then you think about quality. Quality has to do with details that evoke response, sense of purpose, the sense of the presence of the author, the nature of arguments, propositions, speculations, wonderings, uses of emotional appeals. These matters constitute the makings of quality. Surface features tell you how close to the final edit you are.”

"When people are talking about great literature, they are insisting that it is old."

“My main concern is what writing does to and for the psyche.”

“I don’t think it’s particularly good. . . I wouldn’t say that if you weren’t pushing me.”

“Sometimes I know I need to start one when my head starts feeling flat.”

“One tactic I used is that mine was always available – if they wanted to read it, they could.” –journaling

“Lots of writing gets done for purposes of façade.”

“Why, some poetry has to be read out loud because it is a performance and looking at it visually makes no difference.”

“You can’t embrace the poem if you can’t see it.”

“A lot of writing is performance.”

“I sound educated but I also sound foreign – not part of the group.”

“Our language, individually, gives us strengths and also separations. Membership and exclusion.”

“Assume the position.”

“Making the most of your moment. I’m all for that.”

“Carpe Diem is the argument that the guy uses on the girl in the backseat. It isn’t an argument that is always appropriate.”

“Now that I got you to open up a little.”

“You filthy minded critter.”

Fall Semester, 2004 – Methods

“Searching for meaning makes our lives meaningful.”

“If teaching was predictable I would have quit a long time ago.”

“Tell her to just fuck off.”

"There is no one right way to teach."

"Everytime is the best time to restart."

"If teaching were predictable I would have quit a long time ago."

"The best thing we can do for ourselves is to have a sense of mission."

"Teaching is like jumping off a diving board -- you just go at it."
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Pretty good, huh. Unfortunately for me, I think I inspired the quote in red with this less than stellar piece. His and the class' feedback did however help me to become a better writer.

Ahh...memories.