Dan Jorgensen's Blog, page 429

Writing of 'a hunger for life'

“Men can starve from a lack of self-realization as much as they can from a lack of bread.” – Richard Wright
Wright, born in Chicago on this date in 1908, authored at least two American literary classics – his novel Native Son, published in 1940, and his autobiographical Black Boy in 1945.  While some looked upon his works as controversial, most regarded his writing, whether fiction or non, as keys to helping change the conversation about race relations in the United States.  His work has been a force in the social and intellectual history of the United States for 75 years. 
Over the course of his short life (he died in 1960), Wright wrote in a wide variety of genres authoring hundreds of journalistic pieces, many short stories, novels and nonfiction books, poetry, and dozens of hard-hitting essays.   Much of his literature focuses on the plight of African Americans during the late 19th to mid-20th centuries who suffered discrimination and violence, whether they resided in the South or the North.                "Wright was one of the people who made me conscious of the need to struggle", said fellow writer Amiri Baraka.

“I would hurl words into this darkness and wait for an echo,” Wright said,  “and if an echo sounded, no matter how faintly, I would send other words to tell, to march, to fight, to create a sense of hunger for life that gnaws in us all.”



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The beauty of wild places

“The power of imagination makes us infinite.” – John Muir

Muir, who was born in Scotland in 1838 and emigrated to the U.S. in 1849, was also known as "John of the Mountains.”  Author, environmental philosopher and early advocate for the preservation of our wilderness areas, his letters, essays, and books describing his adventures in nature, especially in the Sierra Nevada, have been read by millions.
More than just a “naturalist,” Muir’s musings on nature and his writings about the roles that people must play in preserving our natural world – not only for our own enjoyment and the sake of the plants and animals, but also for future generations and our planet’s well-being – are still the standard followed by most Americans.                                           “Everybody needs beauty as well as bread,” Muir wrote,  “places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul.”
Next time you “take a hike” or just drink in the beauty of our amazing national parks – especially on this weekend where so many are doing just that – thank Muir for his vision and wisdom.  To learn more about Muir’s life and influence, visit the website http://www.pbs.org/nationalparks/people/historical/muir/

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No 'hollow places' in great poems

“I like poems you can tack all over with a hammer and there are no hollow places.” – John Ashbery
   I’ve written of Ashbery before, but wanted to share another of his poems.  Ashbery, who turned 90 this summer, is one of America’s greatest, having won nearly every major poetry award, including the Pulitzer Prize, the National Book Award, the Griffin International Award, and a MacArthur “Genius” Grant.   To spend a few hours immersed in language         and its myriad possibilities, pick up a copy of his Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror or the languid and moving Houseboat Days.
"Few poets have so cleverly manipulated, or just plain tortured, our soiled desire for meaning,” noted critic William Logan.  “[Ashbery] reminds us that most poets who give us meaning don't know what they're talking about."    Here for Saturday’s Poem is Ashbery’s,                         This RoomThe room I entered was a dream of this room.
Surely all those feet on the sofa were mine.
The oval portrait
of a dog was me at an early age.
Something shimmers, something is hushed up.

We had macaroni for lunch every day
except Sunday, when a small quail was induced
to be served to us. Why do I tell you these things?
You are not even here.

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A pulpit for justice

“We crime novelists have a great pulpit. We write about justice and about correcting injustice.” – Jesse Kellerman

Born in Los Angeles on this date in 1978, Kellerman is the oldest son of bestselling mystery novelists Faye Kellerman and Jonathan Kellerman.  He studied psychology at Harvard and playwriting at Brandeis, authoring the critically acclaimed play Things Beyond Our Control, which won him the Princess Grace Award given to the top “emerging authors in theater, dance and film.”
Also a musician, he played as lead guitarist for the LA-based indie rock band "Don't Shoot the Dog" for a number of years before embarking on his crime-writing career.
While he has his own distinctive style that has made him a favorite in the crime scene genre, he also said people shouldn’t be surprised to see influences of his famous parents.  “All writers start out mimicking other writers,” he noted.  “I've never relinquished that. I have a good ear for speech and writing patterns.”                        
                            Kellerman said he likes taking the ordinary and making it extraordinary.  “I prefer to write about ordinary people who find themselves in a singularly bizarre situation - that is to say, the one moment in their lives when they are forced to confront danger or mystery.”
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Sharing that 'good time' writing

“I think good art should always be entertaining, or at least give pleasure of some sort. And my chief goal as a writer has always been to tell a good story and give my readers a good time.” – Kenneth Oppel
Born in Port Alberni, Canada (one of the coolest small port cities I’ve ever had the pleasure of visiting) on this date in 1967, Oppel has had a distinguished career as a children’s and young adult writer.  Among his many awards are Canada’s Governor General's Literary Prize and the Printz Honor Award from the American Library Association (both for Airborn and The Times); and a Best Book for Young Adults from the ALA for Skybreaker.
Currently a resident of Toronto, Oppel started writing as a teen, penning a humorous story about a boy addicted to video games and ultimately his first book Colin's Fantastic Video Adventure, published just as he was starting college.  While in college at the University of Toronto he wrote his second bestseller, The Live-Forever Machine, for a creative writing class project.                One of his most creative and uplifting stories– about a special bond between a teenage boy and a young chimpanzee – is 2011’s bestseller Half Brother, winner of numerous major awards.  It was a story that also touched Oppel’s heart as he wrote it.
“The more I worked on Half Brother,” he said, “the more it seemed to me the story was really about love in all its possible forms - how and why we decide to bestow it, or withdraw it; how we decide what is more worthy of being loved, and what is less.  How we are masters of conditional love."




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Making time for life

“People ask me if I live each day like it's my last, and I don't. I live each day like it's my first, and I can't wait for the next one.”– Kris Carr
A native of New York, Carr (who turns 46 tomorrow) is a New York Timesand Amazon best-selling author, wellness activist and cancer survivor who documented her battle against the disease in the documentary film Crazy Sexy Cancer and a companion book: Crazy Sexy Cancer Tips.  In the book, Carr points out that when she first was diagnosed there weren't any books or movies that dealt with the situations and problems facing young women with cancer – and so she decided to write and produce them.
It’s a lesson for writers who think they have a good idea that no one has done.  If you have the idea, regardless, start writing. 
While Carr has become famous for her books (she has 3 other Crazy, Sexybooks in her series), she had an earlier artistic career.  After college at Sarah Lawrence, she was a dancer, actress and photographer, working both on- and off-Broadway, in film and television, and in many dozens of television commercials.  She also ran her own successful photography business in New York City for nearly 7 years.  Today, in addition to her writing, Carr oversees an online community, My Crazy Sexy Life, with over 40,000 members.                           Still “busy all the time,” she said she didn’t let cancer get in the way of living life to its fullest.  “If we don’t make time for our lives,” she said, “our lives won’t make time for us.”



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Live each day like it's the first

“People ask me if I live each day like it's my last, and I don't. I live each day like it's my first, and I can't wait for the next one.”– Kris Carr
A native of New York, Carr (who turns 46 tomorrow) is a New York Timesand Amazon best-selling author, wellness activist and cancer survivor who documented her battle against the disease in the documentary film Crazy Sexy Cancer and a companion book: Crazy Sexy Cancer Tips.  In the book, Carr points out that when she first was diagnosed there weren't any books or movies that dealt with the situations and problems facing young women with cancer – and so she decided to write and produce them.
It’s a lesson for writers who think they have a good idea that no one has done.  If you have the idea, regardless, start writing. 
While Carr has become famous for her books (she has 3 other Crazy, Sexybooks in her series), she had an earlier artistic career.  After college at Sarah Lawrence, she was a dancer, actress and photographer, working both on- and off-Broadway, in film and television, and in many dozens of television commercials.  She also ran her own successful photography business in New York City for nearly 7 years.  Today, in addition to her writing, Carr oversees an online community, My Crazy Sexy Life, with over 40,000 members.                           Still “busy all the time,” she said she didn’t let cancer get in the way of living life to its fullest.  “If we don’t make time for our lives,” she said, “our lives won’t make time for us.”



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Using words to make magic happen

“The nice thing about being a writer is that you can make magic happen without learning tricks.” – Humphrey Carpenter

Born on this date in 1946, Carpenter, who was both a writer and radio broadcaster, was one of the 20th Century’s leading biographers, including major works on both J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis.  A native of Oxfordshire, England, Carpenter’s  notable output of biographies included J. R. R. Tolkien: A Biography  andThe Inklings: CS Lewis, JRR Tolkien, Charles Williams and their Friends, winner of the 1978 Somerset Maugham Award, given annually to the best book written by someone under the age of 35. 
He also won the prestigious literary award, the Duff Cooper Memorial Prize, for his 1988 book Ezra Pound.                                        When he wasn’t writing, he was performing as a jazz musician, or serving as an engaging broadcaster, host and producer of many of the BBC’s leading series.  He kept up a tireless routine of writing and broadcasting right up to his premature death from Parkinson’s and heart failure at the age of 58.
“You call a star a star, and say it is just a ball of matter moving on a mathematical course. But that is merely how you see it,” he wrote in J.R.R. Tolkien: A Biography. “By so naming things and describing them you are only inventing your own terms about them. And just as speech is invention about objects and ideas, so myth is invention about truth.”


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Here to 'live out loud'

“If you ask me what I came to do in this world, I, an artist, will answer you: I am here to live out loud.” – Emile Zola   Writers, artists, songwriters, performers – all  are tasked with the obligation to "live out loud" and share their worlds, their talents, and their words.   The late writer Janet Frame, who was born in New Zealand on this date in 1924, once noted, “Writing a novel is not merely going on a shopping expedition across the border to an unreal land.  It is hours and years spent in the factories, the streets, the cathedrals of the imagination.”      
                   And Zola,           who wrote countless essays and dozens of books said each artist, musician or writer is born with a dual role.  “The artist is nothing without the gift, but the gift is nothing without work . . . There are two men inside the artist.  The poet and the craftsman. One is born a poet. One becomes a craftsman.”


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Stepping into her own light

“Because Dad was famous, I was so used to being identified as 'John Huston's daughter' that I couldn't think of myself as anyone else.”– Allegra Huston
Born in August, 1964, Huston has moved out of her famous family’s shadow through her success as an award-winning writer and editor.     Her new novel, Say My Name, is making a splash in literary circles following on her earlier success with Love Child: A Memoir of Family Lost and Found.   She also is the writer and producer of the award-winning short film Good Luck, Mr. Gorski.                              London critic Lynn Barber wrote in The Telegraph that, "Huston is an absolutely outstanding writer, incapable of writing a dull sentence."   In collaboration with the poet James Navé, she conducts writing workshops called “The Imaginative Storm,” a multi-day program which they have taught in many places around the world.
Her advice for writers is to the point. “Don't waste time on what's not important. Don't get sucked into the drama. Get on with it: don't dwell on the past. Be a big person; be generous of spirit; be the person you'd admire.”

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