Thursday, May 18, 2006

Evacuation orders revoked

Today I encountered an unfamiliar phrase: "author-evacuated prose." Here is the context: "Rather than emphasizing constructed knowing at the expense of separate knowing, or privileging writing-to-learn over more formal author-evacuated prose, I try to encourage a variety of ways of composing and knowing."

Which is all well and good as long as we can agree on what "author-evacuated prose" means. Prose from which the author has fled as if catching the last helicopter out of Saigon? Prose from which the author has been forcibly removed like a Katrina victim clinging hopelessly to the last vestige of home? Prose which has passed through the author like X-Lax through an anorexic?

Any of these prose styles would send me screaming from the room, but I'm not sure I understand the distinction this passage is trying to make. The equation "informal writing-to-learn = good, formal author-evacuated prose = bad" is a bit reductive. What about formal writing in which the authorial presence is alive and kicking? What about informal writing from which the author has fled in panic? What about writing of any type in which the author has invested so little thought that he casts only the faintest shadow over the finished product? Until I get some solid answers, I'm not signing any evacuation orders.

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