Weekly Blog Post 1

"Women do not always have to write about women, or gay men about gay men. Indeed, something good and new might happen if they did not."---Kathryn Hughes

I appreciate this quote because I wholeheartedly agree with it. My initial reaction and thoughts up on reading it was that she is talking about writers who draw from personal experience in their writing that often only focus on one part of themselves for that element of whatever it is they are writing. Being a woman or a gay man is definitely a part of someone that has the potential to influence all of someone’s decisions, actions, thoughts, their views of the world around them, and how they express themselves in that role. However, there is much more to a person than their gender/sex or sexual orientation. I think she also means this to say that anybody who only focuses on one aspect of their person and uses it to channel their writing through it should take a step back and look at other facets of a bigger picture. When looking at the beginning of the quotes, I noticed that she says “do not always” instead of “do not ever” which means that one doesn’t have to completely ignore those major parts of themselves but simply to embrace not only that particular part but all others that are integrated into their personality and daily lives. This is important not only for one’s own benefit but also for their audience so that the audience is also able to acknowledge another person’s differences and gain new perspectives based on all sorts of the author’s life and personality. At the end of the quote, Hughes states that “something good and new would happen” if an author did not just focus on just one part of themselves, in her example being a woman or a gay man. This means that this person would be able to learn something new about them self through their writing, which makes sense to me because often times writing follows its own path once I get going and I make discoveries about my own thoughts and my own self. In writing about a part of oneself that is yet unexamined, one is able to embrace their full individuality and differences that make them their own person.