Know Your Audience In high school, I had a teacher that always told us, “Know your audience.” Most times, I act like I couldn’t give a damn about my audience, but I find that’s really not the case. While I don’t write solely for my audience – this piece, for example, is far more for […]
Most people will agree that I’m a good writer; at the same time, some of what I’ve written on jsphfrtz.com in recent months might look odd. Like my most recent post about “Taiwan Western Union.” I assume my readers are not fools: they know there is no such thing as “Taiwan Western Union.” So why […]
I’m going to try to start doing that more, like I did in college. Back then, I was impressed when I would pound out 8000 words in an all-nighter. Now, I can do 2000 words an hour without breaking a sweat. So, why don’t I write more? As I age, am I becoming more jaded? […]
This blog has been operational for about a year. Last spring, I decided to put all my old work on here, for people to read – everything from when I was in high school up until my late 20s. I put a lot of academic writing on there and a lot of personal writing from […]
I think when people are forced to write, they often don’t do it well. I believe people can write in a very “tunnel-vision” manner when they are very focused on their writing, and quality suffers for the sake of content. I hate writing poorly, but sometimes, I can’t avoid but to appear to write badly. […]
But, don’t get me wrong. I know. At least, I think I know better than most. I’ve spent most of my life in existential exploration and what is true for me now is as true for me as it has ever been: All knowledge is self-knowledge. Anything we think about the world or about anything, […]
I’ve been writing for many years, but up until recently, I never had a place to put my writings, beyond handing them off to friends. About two months ago, I decided that I wanted to share what I had written over the last decade with everyone. Much of what I write is considered “stream of consciousness” or […]
I was once assigned a paper by a professor of mine, Mr. Gaspeny. This would have been no problem except that he said the paper required a title. I loathe titles – nothing that I write ever initially has a title. When I told Mr. Gaspeny said I don’t “do titles,” he said, “Well…the High […]