Post 4: "All Writing is Autobiography"

Donald M. Murray views all writing as being autobiographical. He questions the fact that many consider academic writing to be non-personal. The writing we create has parts of ourselves embedded in it. Murray believes our writing is shaped by past childhood experiences. Our past experiences shape how we write, and our text is autobiographical because it has been written by us. “The poem that was for a few seconds imaginary has become autobiographical by being written” (61). Murray’s poem is autobiographical because it was created and written by him, and shaped by his own mind. Murray states “I Have my own peculiar way of looking at the world and my own way of using language to communicate what I see"(58). How we see the world based on memories and experiences shapes the way we write. Writing we create in turn becomes autobiographical because we wrote it ourselves based on our view of the world.