Dan Jorgensen's Blog, page 140
June 23, 2023
A Writer's Moment: 'Language is a living thing'
'Language is a living thing'
“Languageis a living thing. We can feel it changing. Parts of it become old: they dropoff and are forgotten. New pieces bud out, spread into leaves, and become bigbranches, proliferating.” – Gilbert Highet
A classicist and literary historian,Highet was born in Scotland in June of 1912 and emigrated to the U.S. with hiswife – the great writer Helen MacInnes – in 1938.
The longtime head of the Greek andLatin Department at Columbia University, he wrote numerous essays and books,hosted a radio program, and served as a judge for the Book-of-the-Month Cluband on the editorial board of Horizon magazine.
But he liked teaching best, and wonnumerous awards and accolades for his classroom work. "The chief aim of education is to showyou, after you make a livelihood, how to enjoy living,” he said. “You can live longest and best and mostrewardingly by attaining and preserving the happiness of learning." His 1976 book The Immortal Profession:The Joys of Teaching and Learning provides an amazing look at this greatteacher’s style.
“(Books) arenot just lumps of lifeless paper,” he said, “but minds alive on the shelves.”
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June 21, 2023
A Writer's Moment: Being 'the hero' of your own story
Being 'the hero' of your own story
“Weall live in suspense from day to day; in other words, you are the hero of yourown story.” – Mary McCarthy
Author, critic and politicalactivist McCarthy was born in Seattle on this date in 1912 and builther reputation as a satirist. Her satirical novel TheGroup, in fact, was on the New YorkTimes Bestseller list for almost two years.
Noted for her precise prose and itscomplex mixture of autobiography and fiction, she was considered a rather“scandalous” writer in her younger years, especially with her first novel The Company She Keeps, which “told itlike it was” in 1930s New York Society.
Winner of two Guggenheim Fellowshipsand a number of other major “funding” awards, she was named for the NationalMedal for Literature and the Edward MacDowell Medal, both in 1984.
Also a respected critic, she was presented with 8 honorary degrees for her groundbreaking work. “The suspense of a novel,” she said, “is not only for the reader, but in thenovelist, who is usually intensely curious about what will happen to her hero.”@font-face {font-family:"ＭＳ 明朝"; panose-1:0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-charset:128; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-format:other; mso-font-pitch:fixed; mso-font-signature:1 134676480 16 0 131072 0;}@font-face {font-family:"ＭＳ 明朝"; panose-1:0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0 0; mso-font-charset:128; mso-generic-font-family:roman; mso-font-format:other; mso-font-pitch:fixed; mso-font-signature:1 134676480 16 0 131072 0;}@font-face {font-family:Cambria; panose-1:2 4 5 3 5 4 6 3 2 4; mso-font-charset:0; mso-generic-font-family:auto; mso-font-pitch:variable; mso-font-signature:3 0 0 0 1 0;}p.MsoNormal, li.MsoNormal, div.MsoNormal {mso-style-unhide:no; mso-style-qformat:yes; mso-style-parent:""; margin:0in; margin-bottom:.0001pt; mso-pagination:widow-orphan; font-size:12.0pt; font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"ＭＳ 明朝"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}.MsoChpDefault {mso-style-type:export-only; mso-default-props:yes; font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-font-family:Cambria; mso-ascii-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-fareast-font-family:"ＭＳ 明朝"; mso-fareast-theme-font:minor-fareast; mso-hansi-font-family:Cambria; mso-hansi-theme-font:minor-latin; mso-bidi-font-family:"Times New Roman"; mso-bidi-theme-font:minor-bidi;}div.WordSection1 {page:WordSection1;}
June 20, 2023
A Writer's Moment: 'Collaborating with the readers'
'Collaborating with the readers'
“Ilove the fact that you collaborate with your readers when you write a book.”– Robert Crais
Born in Louisiana on this date in 1953, Crais isone of America’s bestselling authors of crime fiction, but he didn’t start tocreate novels in the genre until long after he already had made a name forhimself as the writer of scripts for television shows. After graduating from LSU, he moved toHollywood and jumped right into writing for shows like Hill Street Blues and Cagneyand Lacey.
But in the late 1980s he tested thewaters with his first novel, The Monkey’s Raincoat, an instant hit with readersand critics alike – earning everything from “best first novel” to “best mystery.” Since then, he’s had 23 novels, all worldwide bestsellers. He has received the Ross Macdonald Literary Award (for crimefiction) and been named a Grand Master by the Mystery Writers ofAmerica.
“My books come to me in images,” hesaid. “Sometimesthe image is at the beginning of the book, and sometimes it's simply a flashsomewhere in the middle.” His stories are built around his two memorable main characters –Elvis Cole and Joe Pike.
Perhaps his best-known novel, alsomade into a movie, is Hostage, citedfor the great character development throughout. “I write characters and stories that moveme,” he said, “and I write from the heart.”
June 16, 2023
A Writer's Moment: 'The activity of writing changes everything'
'The activity of writing changes everything'
“Mytheory is that literature is essential to society in the way that dreams areessential to our lives. We can't live without dreaming - as we can't livewithout sleep. We are 'conscious' beings for only a limited period of time,then we sink back into sleep - the 'unconscious.' It is nourishing, in ways wecan't fully understand.” – Joyce Carol Oates
Oates, born in Lockport, NY on June 16, 1938, said she loves theprocess of writing - she writes in longhand - and she does so almost every day. The product of aone-room country school (something I share with her) she had her first novel, With Shuddering Fall, published by Vanguard Press in 1963.
That novel’s success opened her writing floodgates resulting in the publication of some 60 novels, a number of plays andnovellas, and many volumes of short stories, poetry, and nonfiction. Forthose efforts she’s won numerous awards, including a National Book Award for Them. A terrific writer in all genres, she’s also wontwo O. Henry Awards and the National Humanities Medal. Three of her novels – Black Water, What I Lived For,and Blonde – along with two of her shortstory collections have been nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. [image error] Joyce CarolOates
“Ihave forced myself to begin writing when I've been utterly exhausted," she said, "when I'vefelt my soul as thin as a playing card…and somehow the activity of writingchanges everything.”
June 11, 2023
'Stories just need to be told'
“Fansare always asking me where I get my ideas from. The answer is that I'm verycurious, and I get inspiration from everywhere. I read the newspapersvoraciously, so I know what's going on in real crime. I pay attention to thestrange stories people tell me, and I also read a lot of scientific andforensic journals.” – Tess Gerritsen
Born on June 12, 1953Gerritsen is the best-selling author of the Rizzoli& Isles series, which also was made into the very popular TVseries. A native of San Diego, she isthe child of a Chinese immigrant and a Chinese-American seafood chef, who grewup wanting to write her own Nancy Drew type novels. “I'd been writing storiessince I was a child,” she said. “I wrote little books for my mom and bound themmyself with needle and thread. Mostly, they were about my pets.”
Although she longed to be afull-time writer, her family had reservations about the sustainability of awriting career, prompting Gerritsen to choose medicineinstead. Ultimately, of course, thatknowledge of medical procedures proved invaluable in her writing, especiallywhen writing about the Maura Isles character, who is a medical examiner. Although she didn’t start writing until her mid-30s, Gerritsen’s bookshave been published in 40 countries and have sold 25 million copies.
In addition to her detective andmystery books, she has contributed essays in volumes published by
MysteryWriters of America and International Thriller Writers. “Even if I never sold another book, I'dkeep writing, because the stories are here, in my head. Stories that just need to be told,” shesaid. “I love watching a plot unfold, andfeeling the surprise when the unexpected happens.”
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