WRITING TO CHANGE THE WORLD
By Mary Pipher
Riverhead, 2006
Category: Non-fiction for adults (a craft book for writers)
I found WRITING TO CHANGE THE WORLD at my local bookstore last year and couldn’t resist the flap copy: “[this] is a book that will shake up your beliefs, expand your mind, and possibly even inspire you to make your own mark on the world.” Seemed to me a rather tall order for a single book. I’m happy to report that Mary Pipher delivered with quiet style.
Early on, as an example of activist writing, Pipher shared an article she wrote for the September 2004 issue of Psychotherapy Networker. It is a clinical assessment of a fictional patient by the name of Mr. United States of America. One particular line resonated with me and qualifies as having shaken up my beliefs. That line? “[Mr USA] crafted a Bill of Rights, but no corresponding Bill of Responsibilities.” Woah.
Later, Pipher challenged nonfiction writers to think bigger. Don’t simply share the conventional wisdom in new ways, she says, but instead, rethink the wisdom based on your research, your knowledge, and your experience. As an example, Pipher talked about the hard work of crafting her bestselling Reviving Ophelia: “I slashed and burned through my manuscript, crossing out every ‘Based on the previous information, we could tentatively conclude for certain populations …’ and instead wrote, ‘We live in a girl-poisoning culture.’ This section of the book forced me to think hard about taking a stand in my own work; it is safe to say my mind has been expanded.
As for inspiration, I found it throughout the book, but most especially in these lines: “In a sense, all people are riding a rickety boat across dangerous seas. I like to think of writers as the steady ones saying, ‘Breath deeply, stay steady, we will make it if we help one another.’”
I’m glad I have this one in my library, and I’d recommend it to nonfiction writers, both beginning and practicing, who want to think harder about how their words mark the world.