I have until next week to write the introduction to this dissertation, yes it is a first draft, but this is where word meets a page and you learn whether or not your entire argument is rubbish. The problem stems from the fact that this isn't a question we've picked from a list, this is something you care about and have chosen because it interests you, and so if it doesn't work then you don't work as a historian (in this case). What makes it especially intimidating is that I tend to leave introductions until last because whatever intro I've written in the beginning is NOT what I actually end up arguing in the body of the essay. This should offer me comfort: what I write now will never see the final product, but it's the entire ordeal of beginning.
Introductions require definitions and I cover a lot of themes that don't have distict academic definition as it touches on historical queerness. This means I have to focus on the historiography of these concepts, except many don't cover the medieval period so in turn I have to 'use their approaches'. There is also the option of making my own definitions and yet as an undergraduate I fear I do not have to authority to do so. It is altogether an absolute kerfuffle that I just do not want to tackle.
Not only this but it forces me to actually have an argument when I haven't finished all the readings. Whilst, yes, there is the comfort of the imperminance of a first draft, but I doubt my supervisor would want the argument to change entirely mid-project (which usually happens for me). Hell, my most recent exam saw me having to rewrite the entire essay the day before it was due. Things tend to click in the final moments as I spend hours mulling over topics when I'm meant to be doing anything but the essay. Here, it just does not feel possible.
It is a case of confidence. After the exam period, I simply do not know whether those essays were even legible so how do I even dare write something as important as the dissertation. What writing here, as well as in a journal, was supposed to do was make typing out words easier, I needed to learn the skill of thinking on a digital document instead of a physical page. Yet now it has become a tool for distraction. I can write as many drafts for blogposts as I wish, but none of them are going to get me a grade. Even this very post is a form of procrastination. If only it could be a warm up.
Have any of you finished uni? Completed a thesis? Did you take forever to start or were you able to rip the plaster off quick and easy?