My Preferred Writing Genres

I prefer to write in one of two genres. The first technical genre as defined by Yagoda would be persuasion, but more specifically I enjoy writing in the legal genre. I also sometimes enjoy writing fiction, although I do not do it on my own and have only written fiction pieces for classes. I think that I prefer fiction because I enjoy reading fiction, in fact it accounts for almost all of my recreational reading. I also think that I prefer to write in the legal genre because it really interests me. Another reason that I think I like writing legal documents is because I plan on using it as a career. I don’t think that the constraints associated with fiction have really influenced the form of my writing in a large way. I tend to be brief with my adjectives and descriptions which, someone pointed out to me, is a technique that Stephen King employs. So that probably influenced me subconsciously because I really enjoy his work. I would really like to someday write a novel, but in realistic terms I think I will most likely end up doing only legal writing in the future. As far as the legal genre goes, they tend to talk in circles and aren't always clear on what they are saying. Law briefs and legal opinions also like to use a lot of jargon that doesn't really mean anything to anyone outside of the law community. I deliberately try to avoid this. I still use legal jargon that is necessary to sounding professional in this genre, but I don’t use it excessively and I try very hard to make my points clear in my legal writing. I would really like it if people outside of the legal community would be able to understand most of my legal writing. I feel that would be very useful because people outside of the law community do often have to read law briefs, and speaking from experience it’s really frustrating when you've read eight pages of a brief and you still have no idea what they are saying. That has definitely consciously influenced my legal writing.

The Evolution of My Voice

I have noticed different changes in my writing, in both the creative genre and the professional genre. In the creative genre I've found that I’m more willing to take risks. For example, I wrote a short story “The Flowers” this year in the third person. In the past I would have never written something in the third person because it can be hard to maintain, and honestly a bit intimidating. Another risk in my creative works that I have noticed I am more willing to take is the avoidance of clichés to describe something. For example, instead of using the red hue of a fire truck in a story I described a more muted shade of red. While this may be a bit more difficult for a reader to envision, I do not believe that it will be so difficult that it causes them to put down my story. As for my professional writing, I have noticed more subtle changes in my work. One thing I have noticed is that I am more efficient in using the technical terms I need. It seems that I used to sometimes just drop jargon into a paragraph where it didn't really fit, just so I could seem like I knew what I was talking about. Now, I use jargon correctly and recognize that it is not always needed to get my point across. In my creative writing I think I still write a lot like I talk, which helps me with dialogue. In my professional writing I still use an appropriate vocabulary for the level of knowledge I have in the field I’m writing about, but my level of knowledge has increased. In my creative writing I hope my voice will develop in a way that is recognizable, but not out-of-date. I want people to be able to know I wrote something, but not to be writing the same type of thing that eventually becomes dated and stale. In my professional writing I would like my voice to develop in a way that adds clarity to my work, but still allows me to utilize the legal and professional terms that I must use in the field in which I am writing.