Narrating From the Background vs. Foreground

The purpose of writing—and, indeed, its “principle reward”—is breaking through the barriers that separate the minds of writers from their readers. 

This sentiment planted years ago as a North Star in my own writing life, with many thanks to Strunk and White’s The Elements of Style. 

When you imagine a barrier between you and readers, what immediately comes to mind?

For me, it is a large, fallen tree trunk. Not insurmountable, but in the way, nonetheless. It doesn’t block my entire view of the field from which I write. But if I weren’t watching for it, I would easily trip over my own two feet. 

This is how I feel often when I write something that doesn’t seem to “lift” with readers. Like a barrier was in the way, and that perhaps there is also practical work to be done on the essays and poems I want to give to the world. In that spirit—of tripping over logs and relaxing with the desire to connect—we start the first “writing lesson” in The Elements of Substack Style.

We’re starting here

Today I’m drawing from Chapter V, An Approach to Style. I expect to hop around a bit, perhaps through practicals or even the meaning of language and its power in what we share. I hope to invite you—regardless of your writing age, as

Russell Nohelty

so aptly puts it—to consider how traditional elements of writing style and guidance weave into our immediate experience as writers (on Substack and beyond). 

When should writing guidance change our approach? When should it rightly be ignored or reimagined? As an autistic editor, I’ll be taking the time to consider how writing guidance can be misconstrued if you’re neurodiverse, and offer some practical ways to consider its merits without losing track of your self-trust.

Today we’re going to start with the first “approach” in Chapter V:

Place yourself in the background.

Write in a way that draws the reader’s attention to the sense and substance of the writing, rather than to the mood and temper of the author. If the writing is solid and good, the mood and temper of the writer will eventually be revealed and not at the expense of the work. Therefore, the first piece of advice is this: to achieve style, begin by affecting none—that is, place yourself in the background. A careful and honest writer does not need to worry about style. As you become proficient in the use of language, your style will emerge, and when this happens you will find it increasingly easy to break through the barriers that separate you from other minds, other hearts—which is of course, the purpose of writing, as well as its principal reward. Fortunately, the act of composition, or creation, disciplines the mind; writing is one way to go about thinking, and the practice and habit of writing not only drain the mind but supply it, too.

OK, let’s look at this a little more closely.

Place yourself in the background

I picked this piece of advice because it shows up everywhere in writing circles. It shows up subtly in the “Who am I writing for?” debates and it helps us recenter on the value of being a writer who is eager to let all readers in. I think considering where we belong in the context of the stories that we’re entrusted with is also very wise. I appreciate the reminder that when we become proficient in how we use language, our “style will emerge.”

I also feel this piece of guidance is piping hot with ambiguity. The more I sit with it and try to apply it to how I see the world, I am filled with questions.

So, I should want to remove barriers between me and readers. But I should also place myself in the background of my writing. How does that work?

This is the kind of writing guidance that makes sense at first glance from a place of high brow, dispassionate, literary critique. But when it wiggles more deeply inside my mind and direct experience, I can see how this has likely caused a lot of trouble and created terrific writer’s block for me and possibly countless others.

Before we jump into a reframe of this advice, I think it’s helpful to remember that much of The Elements of Style was written in 1919. Fill in the cultural blanks there, as you see fit. The world was quite different 100 years ago and had what most of us would consider a narrow definition for how a “worthy” writer was pieced together. 

This advice, like so much writing directions fallen on autistic ears, can also translate as:

Don’t ever write about yourself. Don’t write about what interests you. Don’t use the word “I.” Don’t use your life as material for writing inspiration (it can’t be trusted and no one wants to hear it anyways). 

So how do we reframe this?

Objectively speaking, as an editor, I have to say that any piece of writing that reads like “I saw… I ate… I arrived… I leapt… I felt… I liked…” is quite boring. But it’s not for the reasons we often assume. It’s not because the writer is talking about themselves or putting themselves “too much” in the foreground. It’s because this is not how we experience the world as human beings. 

We are humans with skin that creates pearls of sweat when a room gets too warm. We’re people who move through the world, taking in literally hundreds of stimuli just walking from the car into the library. We aren’t living our lives as “I saw… I ate… I arrived…” We are, for better or worse, soaked in the tangibles of the world and creatures around us.

Flipping this guidance on its head, I would say that the way to let your style emerge is to first examine what innately draws you to observe it. To, yes, let yourself soak into the foreground of your life and your first drafts. And then sit back and widen the gaze of your observations.

Who was there? What was the temperature outside? What made the room rise with laughter? If your toes could talk, what would they say about the sand?

Let yourself into the foreground if this is easiest for your first drafts. Don’t be shy or embarrassed that you have a self-first narrator showing up on the page. (Your narrator won’t know how to let others in if they aren’t free to roam first!) Let playfulness come along for this experiment and wonder: for heaven’s sake, why do I talk endlessly about the color of my childhood home on Esquire Lane? 

The first step to finding your style is to let yourself into the foreground. To let yourself play with abandon and delight in the stories you want to tell. Let your narrator dwell in their own "mood and temper," focusing on the body, the meaning-making they're doing, the thoughts and beliefs they're crafting. Let them play observer to their own internal and external experiences first, as it's these human experiences that will ultimately "break through the barriers that separate you from other minds, other hearts."

Speaking of beautiful moments! I want to give a heartfelt shoutout to the newest paid readers of The Editing Spectrum.

Randy Osborne

 ,

Mara Kazantzaki

, Valerie , Carl S. and

Jenna Makowski

. It’s so lovely to have you keeping us company here and supporting our weekly creative interview series, Cave of the Heart. (Up Next: Renowned Buddhist teacher and author, Susan Piver!

For the Month of May

Where have you seen this advice show up elsewhere in the world of writing? Or even the world at large?

» I’m going to be watching for moments in my own writing, especially on Substack, where the tendency to push myself into the background is, perhaps, stifling my ability to connect with the details that could make a story richer. 

Tell me how you can join this practice, too.

How can you let yourself into the foreground of your writing? And then practice sitting back and widening the gaze of your observations?