{"id":820,"date":"2011-03-24T10:03:18","date_gmt":"2011-03-24T14:03:18","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.wabash.edu\/fyi\/?p=820"},"modified":"2011-03-24T10:03:18","modified_gmt":"2011-03-24T14:03:18","slug":"pat-madden-to-think-without-restraint","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/2011\/03\/24\/pat-madden-to-think-without-restraint\/","title":{"rendered":"Patrick Madden: “To Think Without Restraint”"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"<\/a>Steve Charles<\/em>\u2014Students in Professor Eric Freeze\u2019s Travel Writing class were still introducing themselves to MacGregor Visiting Writer Patrick Madden on Monday afternoon when the author suddenly stood up.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat\u2019s that?\u201d he asked the startled students.\u00a0Sliding behind one young man’s chair and making his way to the window in the Detchon Center classroom he asked again:<\/p>\n

\u201cDo you hear that?\u201d<\/p>\n

The students looked confused.<\/p>\n

\u201cYou don\u2019t hear that?\u201d he asked, leaning to the window sill to peer outside. \u201cThey\u2019re saying something\u2014you hear that?\u201d<\/p>\n

A slight unease buzzed among the students. Was this guy nuts?<\/em><\/p>\n

Then with perfect timing, Madden fixed his gaze on Sphinx Club pledge Ryan Lutz \u201913, who was wearing the trademark ragged pot and odd garb of the Club\u2019s initiates. The writer\u2019s face broke into a mischievous grin.<\/p>\n

\u201cDo I hear, \u2018Air Raid?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

The students still heard nothing but Madden\u2019s words, but they got the joke. Worries that their guest might be a lunatic evaporated into relief and laughter. Earlier in the day the author had asked about the College\u2019s \u201cspirit and leadership organization\u201d (and its members wearing their signature red and white striped overalls). He’d learned of the club’s unusual initiation rite requiring pledges to fall on their backs and yell \u201cBoom, Boom, Boom\u201d anytime someone yells, \u201cAir raid.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201cSo aren\u2019t you supposed to do something?\u201d Madden asked Lutz over the chuckles of his classmates.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe have rules,\u201d Lutz said, and he was right\u2014pledge activities can\u2019t disturb the classroom.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m disappointed,\u201d Madden said, playfully shrugging his shoulders and sitting down next to the pledge. And thus began an hour and a half writer\u2019s workshop session concentrating on three of the students\u2019 essays.<\/p>\n

There\u2019s teaching by word and teaching by example. A professor at Brigham Young University and author of the recently published book of essays Quotidiana,<\/em> Madden proved skillful at helping students find the words to improve their own work during the two workshop sessions he led.<\/p>\n

But that \u201cair raid\u201d request was an unforgettable example for writing students of the way a writer comes at the world\u2014not only paying attention to his new surroundings, but engaging an audience with his discoveries.<\/p>\n

<\/a><\/p>\n

That\u2019s Madden\u2019s stock in trade as a teacher and master of the associative essay, a craft he sums up as \u201cconnecting little snippets of observation.\u201d At\u00a0a noontime public reading in Lovell Lecture Hall on Tuesday, Madden’s host and fellow BYU and Ohio University grad Freeze noted that the author’s subjects range from music (as in Led Zepellin, Rush, Beatles) to Montevideo, Uruguay to laughter to doppelgangers to garlic.<\/p>\n

The essayist majored in physics as an undergraduate and his writing carries a scientist’s meticulous observation skills infused with wild curiosity and love of language as a tool for exploration.<\/p>\n

“Almost any work in cutting edge physics is invisible,” Madden told students. “I wanted something more tangible. I didn’t want to go after one interest. I thought if I could write essay I could study what most interested me at the time.”<\/p>\n

Currently those topics include: What is originality? What is time? And Madden read to his Wabash audience a recently completed essay on momentum that blends physics and metaphysics with an injury to his daughter, the memory of brother-in-law’s burns and \u201ca mother\u2019s momentous guilt”\u2014a piece in which objective observation leads to the deeply personal and moving, even faith.<\/p>\n

“I love to think without restraint,” Madden said. In an interview on The Fine Delight <\/em>blog, the author said this about one of his earliest essays: “It sprawls rather wildly, but I tried to contain it with subtitles and clever transitions and repetitions and resonances of symbol or idea. And in any case, I believe that, punning on Paul, ‘All things work to the good of them that love essays.’\u201d<\/p>\n

Madden opened his public reading Tuesday as he had his class a day earlier\u2014with a question:<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat is the Wabash motto?”<\/p>\n

\u201cWabash always fights,\u201d several responded.<\/p>\n

“Not that one,”\u00a0Madden said. And as students and faculty pondered the visitor’s question, the screen behind him flashed \u201cScientia et Virtute'”<\/p>\n

“This one,” he said. \u201cKnowledge and virtue.\u00a0I like it because it seems a good two poles to describe what the essay does, away of exploring knowledge in a virtuous way\u2014looking for the good in the world and in life.”<\/p>\n

Madden\u2019s travel writing has focused primarily on his wife\u2019s home country of Uruguay.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>\u201cBut you don\u2019t have to travel far from home,\u201d Madden told students. In fact, two of the most successful student essays the group workshopped during the writer\u2019s three-day stay on campus were about the students\u2019 home places. \u201cTravel writing is not about the exotic, but thinking about a place in interesting ways,\u201d Madden said. \u201cI\u2019m intrigued by a writer who explores meaning wherever he may go, and to relive someone else\u2019s experience in a virtual way can be richer\u2014words can be better than experience.\u201d<\/p>\n

It\u2019s too early to know if Madden\u2019s words and workshop will inspire and improve the writing of Eric Freeze\u2019s travel writing students. Two of their essays have real possibilities for publication. But will those students find the patience, humility, and self-discipline to revise in these lengthening days of early spring.<\/p>\n

If they don\u2019t, it won\u2019t be because they haven\u2019t seen how the work is done. From his air raid request to his reflections on the nature of momentum, Madden has opened their eyes to a much wider range of possibilities, as well as a writer\u2019s responsibility to think, learn, and write without restraint.<\/p>\n

In photos: (top left) Patrick Madden in Professor Freeze’s Travel Writing class; (above right) Liam Smith talk with Madden about his own writing.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Steve Charles\u2014Students in Professor Eric Freeze\u2019s Travel Writing class were still introducing themselves to MacGregor Visiting Writer Patrick Madden on Monday afternoon when the author suddenly stood up. \u201cWhat\u2019s that?\u201d he asked […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":16,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-820","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"w_featured_image_url":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-content\/uploads\/sites\/4\/2011\/03\/pat1lores.jpg","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/820","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/16"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=820"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/820\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=820"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=820"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.wabash.edu\/fyi\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=820"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}