Dan Jorgensen's Blog, page 354

Journalism: A Key Cog In Our Society

“In the end, does it really matter if newspapers physically disappear?  Probably not:  the world is always changing.  But does it matter if organizations independent enough and rich enough to employ journalists to do their job disappear?  Yes, that matters hugely; it affects the whole of life and society.”– Andrew Marr
Born July 31, 1959, Marr is a British commentator, broadcaster and journalist who is former editor of The Independent and longtime political editor of BBC News.   He reflects a worry shared by many of us who have started as or continue to serve as journalists – that our newer generation of readers is forgetting about the valuable role that journalists have in our society, and that funding for newspapers as we long have known them is rapidly disappearing.  
“The business of funding ‘digging journalists’ is important to encourage,” he noted.  “It cannot be replaced by bloggers who don’t have access to politicians, who don’t have easy access to official documents, who aren’t able to buttonhole people in power.” 
 Keeping this thought in the conversation is important for everyone who writes.


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A Writer's Moment: Journalism: A Key Cog In Our Society

A Writer's Moment: Journalism: A Key Cog In Our Society: “In the end, does it really matter if newspapers physically disappear?   Probably not:   the world is always changing....

A Writer's Moment: Immersing Readers Into The Story

A Writer's Moment: Immersing Readers Into The Story: "Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia."   -- E.L. Doctorow Novelist and historian E.L. Doctorow, whose novel...

Immersing Readers Into The Story

"Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia."  -- E.L. Doctorow

Novelist and historian E.L. Doctorow, whose novel Ragtime won every major writing award and was the precursor of many other great works to follow, said that it is the historian's place to tell us about a time in history or an era, but it is the novelist's role to tell us how we would act and feel if we lived in that time or era.

Born in 1931 (he died in 2015), Doctorow created characters that exemplified Ernest Hemingway's admonition that when writing a novel, the writer should create living people “ . . . people, not characters.  A character is a caricature." 
                                                
I thought about Doctorow and his marvelous work recently while doing a radio interview about my own novel And The Wind Whispered, which I set in the 1890s in South Dakota’s Black Hills.   "You really put us into the time and place," the interviewer said.  "Did you feel an obligation to make that real to us, so that we would know?"

I used Doctorow's words above as part of my response, saying that it is, indeed, the writer's obligation.  It is not acceptable to be  “mostly right.”  We must be completely right in what we share if we are to remain true to our craft and the great writers like him who have led us along the way.  
“Good writing is supposed to evoke sensation in the reader,” Doctorow once said.  “Not the fact that it is raining, but the feeling of being rained upon.”

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A Writer's Moment: 'Leaping' Into The Unknown

A Writer's Moment: 'Leaping' Into The Unknown: Part of writing a novel is being willing to leap into the blackness. You have very little idea, really, of what's ...

'Leaping' Into The Unknown

Part of writing a novel is being willing to leap into the blackness. You have very little idea, really, of what's going to happen. You have a broad sense, maybe, but it's this rash leap. – Chang-Rae Lee
Born in Korea on this date in 1965, Lee is a novelist and professor of creative writing at Princeton where he has headed up that program for many years.  Lee has used his Korean immigrant experience as a focal point for his award-winning writing.  But, while that is his own focus, he stresses with students to be aware of a broad spectrum of writing and writing styles.
“I'll offer them stories from Anton Chekhov to Denis Johnson, from Flannery O'Connor to A.M. Homes.   Perhaps investigating all that strange variation of beauty has rubbed off on me … (and) that's why I enjoy teaching literature.”           Lee's first novel, Native Speaker, won numerous prizes, including the prestigious Hemingway Foundation/PEN Award. The novel centers around a Korean American industrial spy and explores themes of alienation and betrayal as felt or perpetrated by immigrants and first-generation citizens, something he’s repeated in other works. 
Often, he said, he isn’t sure where he’s headed when he starts writing, but that’s not a bad thing.   As for what's the most challenging aspect of teaching, he said it is convincing younger writers of the importance of reading widely and passionately.   “I often think that the prime directive for me as a teacher of writing is akin to that for a physician, which is this: do no harm.”


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Celebrating 'A Writer Extraordinaire'

“Never use the word 'audience.' The very idea of a public, unless the poet is writing for money, seems wrong to me. Poets don't have an 'audience'. They're talking to a single person all the time.” – Robert Graves

Born July 24, 1895, Graves was a British poet, historical novelist, critic, and classicist who published nearly 60 volumes of poetry along with dozens of other writings in all genres.  Among his 120-plus total volumes was the world-renowned novel I, Claudius, and his historical memoir on WWII, Goodbye To All That.           Graves’s sad love poems are regarded as among the finest produced in the English language during the 20th century.  For Saturday’s Poem, here is Graves’,
A Lover Since Childhood
Tangled in thought am I,
Stumble in speech do I?
Do I blunder and blush for the reason why?
Wander aloof do I,
Lean over gates and sigh,
Making friends with the bee and the butterfly?

    If thus and thus I do,
    Dazed by the thought of you,
    Walking my sorrowful way in the early dew,
    My heart cut through and through
    In this despair of you,
    Starved for a word or a look will my hope renew:


    give then a thought for me
    Walking so miserably,
    Wanting relief in the friendship of flower or tree;
    Do but remember, we
    Once could in love agree,
    Swallow your pride, let us be as we used to be.


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A Writer's Moment: Celebrating 'A Writer Extraordinaire'

A Writer's Moment: Celebrating 'A Writer Extraordinaire': “Never use the word 'audience.' The very idea of a public, unless the poet is writing for money, seems wrong t...

A Writer's Moment: Writing Effectively By Keeping It Simple

A Writer's Moment: Writing Effectively By Keeping It Simple: “So many people think that if you're writing fantasy, it means you can just make everything up as you go. Want to add a dragon? Add a ...

Writing Effectively By Keeping It Simple

“So many people think that if you're writing fantasy, it means you can just make everything up as you go. Want to add a dragon? Add a dragon! Want some magic? Throw it in. But the thing is, regardless of whether you're dealing with realism or fantasy, every world has rules. Make sure to establish a natural order.” – V. E. Schwab
 Born on July 27, 1987, Victoria Elizabeth Schwab is perhaps best known for her novel Vicious, her Shades of Magic series, and for her children's and young adult fiction written as Victoria Schwab.  The daughter of a British mom and “Beverly Hills” dad, she grew up on both the West Coast and in the Deep South, a lover of fairytales, folklore “and books that make me wonder if the world is really as it seems.”
A graduate of Washington University in St. Louis, she studied everything from Physics to Film to Art History and English, then held a wide variety of jobs before turning to writing.  Not a bad career move. 
Her work has received critical acclaim, been featured by writing magazines and The New York Times alike,been translated into more than a dozen languages, and been optioned for TV and Film.  She said she loves working in many different genres and writing for all ages.   “I still get rejections - frequently - and my goal isn't to never fail, to never be turned down, but simply to succeed more often than I don't,” she said.  “And in order to do that, I have to constantly put myself out there, to judgment, critique, and rejection.”                     As for writing advice, she noted, “I think a lot of writers are tempted to add complexity by over-complicating things, but always remember that most natural rules/laws are, at their core, simple. Start simple, and build from there, or you risk getting yourself and your readers tangled.”







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