In 1972 Howard Pierson published a book on teaching writing called Teaching Writing. It's a serious book, forward looking, strong on process, group work, and peer critique, all backed with contemporary research. The last chapter even summarizes the two previous decades of research, ending with some shrewd questions that researchers need to take up (e.g.,"What is the best number of students for work in a subgroup?").

Oddly, the book didn't make much of an impact. You rarely see it mentioned in post-secondary composition studies. Maybe it dropped out of professional sight because it was issued by a publisher with a reputation for textbooks (Prentice-Hall), or because it was written, as the author explains, for "teachers in secondary schools and college, particularly junior college" (Pierson taught at Nassau Community College in Garden City, NY). Students are quaintly called "pupils" throughout.

But there is an even odder oddity. Pierson himself may never have been aware of it. It's the message hidden in the picture on the dust jacket.

Enlarge the portion of that Pollockesque design I have marked off in red. Then give it a three-quarters turn to the right. What kind of beast is this, hidden in the random swirls and debris of the picture? But this is not the end of the message. Further enlarge the section outlined in red, and you can barely make out some writing above the back foot, if it is writing, if it is a foot. But with a final enlargement, and a vertical transposition, the message becomes clear--or at least as clear as it is ever going to get. I make out, "COMPSKINK SUCKS ROCKS."

What in heaven's name is a compskink? Is it a comp-skink or a comps-kink? What possible benefit will it get from sucking rocks? Why was such an unsettling message hidden in the cover of an harmless book on teaching writing? Did readers absorb this message subliminally, and is that the reason the book never caught on? And who snuck in this cryptic phrase here?

We may never know the answer to these questions, nor know for sure if there is any connection between the doleful critter lurking in the dust jacket and Pierson's first chapter, which he called "Writing Abandoned," and the first part of that chapter, which he called "Unriddling Some Riddles about Writing."

RH, July 2004

PS: One effort to unriddle the strange word "compskink."