angela hormberg

Category: A Writer’s Day

  • A Writer’s Day – Elisabeth Elliot

    A Writer’s Day – Elisabeth Elliot

    Following is an excerpt from Elisabeth Elliot’s September 29, 1969 journal, which describes a typical writing day for her.

    “It is a Monday Morning and having put last night’s and this morning’s dishes in the dishwasher, I washed the remaining pots and pans, cleaned up the stove and counter, made the bed, and cleaned up the puppy’s scatterings. Then I checked my list for today: grocery-shopping, doctor’s appointment, pick up photographs, call locksmith to fix bathroom door, clean Add’s study, put prices on things for garage sale, write Tom, call Katherine, finish making skirt, wash hair, get out winter clothes, return book to library, iron, have Elizabeth for lunch. Now I have come down to my study to try to put in two hours of writing.”

    Work Cited

    Elliot, Elisabeth. “From My Journal”. Elisabeth Elliot. 6 Jan 2022. https://elisabethelliot.org/resource-library/devotionals/from-my-journal/. Accessed 21 Dec 2024.

    © 2024 Angela Hormberg

  • A Writer’s Day – C.S. Lewis

    A Writer’s Day – C.S. Lewis

    This excerpt is taken almost in its entirety from C.S. Lewis’ Surprised by Joy, and is his idea of a “normal day” (209).

    “We now settled into a routine which has ever since served in my mind as an archetype, so that what I still mean when I speak of a “normal day” (and lament that normal days are so rare) is a day of the Bookham pattern.

    For if I could please myself I would always live as I lived there.

    I would choose always to breakfast at exactly eight and to be at my desk by nine, there to read or write till one. If a cup of good tea or coffee could be brought me about eleven, so much the better. A step or so out of doors for a pint of beer would not do quite so well; for a man does not want to drink alone and if you meet a friend in the taproom the break is likely to be extended beyond its ten minutes. At one precisely lunch should be on the table; and by two at the latest I would be on the road. Not, except at rare intervals, with a friend.

    Walking and talking are two very great pleasures, but it is a mistake to combine them.

    Our own noise blots out the sounds and silences of the outdoor world; and talking leads almost inevitably to smoking, and then farewell to nature as far as one of our senses is concerned. The only friend to walk with is one…who so exactly shares your taste for each mood of the countryside that a glance, a halt, or at most a nudge, is enough to assure us that the pleasure is shared. The return from the walk, and the arrival of tea, should be exactly coincident, and not later than a quarter past four. Tea should be taken in solitude, as I took it at Bookham on those (happily numerous) occasions when Mrs. Kirkpatrick was out; the Knock himself disdained this meal.

    For eating and reading are two pleasures that combine admirably.

    Of course not all books are suitable for mealtime reading…

    At five a man should be at work again, and at it till seven. Then, at the evening meal and after, comes the time for talk, or, failing that, for lighter reading” (209-211).

    Works Cited

    Lewis, C. S. Surprised by Joy: The Shape of My Early Life. Walker and Company, 1955.

    © 2024 Angela Hormberg