Jeannine Atkins's Blog, page 40
December 10, 2010
Collecting and Trimming, Words and Wreaths
I just read a great interview with Ted Kooser in The Writer's Chronicle (Oct/Nov issue). Our former poet laureate refers to John Berger and how artists draw. "They begin with their concentration mostly on the subject beyond them, but at some point the drawing itself becomes of more interest, and the subject falls back." Ted Kooser says this is how he often writes, beginning with a person or place that drops back as each word on the page starts to direct the next.
I notice this happening with me, too. Some of the facts I find from research become sort of like the dots to connect on one of those old connect-the-dots drawings (do they still make those?) Of course there's more freedom when composing, but the positioning of facts and key objects gives me a frame. For instance, learning that Marie Curie gave her daughters green nets to catch butterflies was an image that haunted me, partly because of the gift of the detail of green. When writing Borrowed Names, this led me to pore over books about butterflies around the world, pick up a book by the famous French entomologist Fabre, and study pictures of Paris gardens, thinking about the sorts of butterflies the Curies might have caught. Some of what I culled became dots or glimmers that directed one poem, then flashed briefly in another.
So you can see why there are more cross-outs and arrows than words on many of my drafts. I try lots of images before finding the right ones, then the work becomes about how they will connect. I need to start out with a lot before finding what looks good, as I said to a writer friend on Sunday while making wreaths. Ellen admired the bushiness of mine. I said this was how I wrote, going for broke, and leaving the clipping for later. The colors of the spruce and hemlock tell you if, that day, in your eyes, they want red ribbon or holly berries or pale dried grasses or a glittery band of stars. And the particular butterfly you set in a poem, or the particular words for that butterfly, suggest who might be watching or running in another direction, or what could happen once the nets are put away. It doesn't much matter who or what inspired a poem, once I start keeping an eye out on where my own words might lead.
Soon I'll pick back up Ted Kooser's Poetry Repair Manual, and I think my favorite volume of his poems, Delights and Shadows. In the Judith Harris interview he speaks of its themes of delights in a field of darkness. "Every activity in life is undertaken with death observing from a distance… At so many feasts, we find ourselves setting a place for the dead – 'Oh, don't you wish Aunt Mabel were here?' – and the nearness of death lends the food savor."
And I'll wonder if I should trim the wreath on my door a bit more. Nah. My friend worried that the stuff on her leaner wreath would blow away.
My husband said, That's what's supposed to happen.
The world is windy. Dried grasses or blooms fall off, like memories or extraneous facts. But the green circle will hold for a while.
For more Poetry Friday posts, on Emily Dickinson's birthday, pour yourself more tea and visit: http://jamarattigan.livejournal.com/492549.html
I notice this happening with me, too. Some of the facts I find from research become sort of like the dots to connect on one of those old connect-the-dots drawings (do they still make those?) Of course there's more freedom when composing, but the positioning of facts and key objects gives me a frame. For instance, learning that Marie Curie gave her daughters green nets to catch butterflies was an image that haunted me, partly because of the gift of the detail of green. When writing Borrowed Names, this led me to pore over books about butterflies around the world, pick up a book by the famous French entomologist Fabre, and study pictures of Paris gardens, thinking about the sorts of butterflies the Curies might have caught. Some of what I culled became dots or glimmers that directed one poem, then flashed briefly in another.
So you can see why there are more cross-outs and arrows than words on many of my drafts. I try lots of images before finding the right ones, then the work becomes about how they will connect. I need to start out with a lot before finding what looks good, as I said to a writer friend on Sunday while making wreaths. Ellen admired the bushiness of mine. I said this was how I wrote, going for broke, and leaving the clipping for later. The colors of the spruce and hemlock tell you if, that day, in your eyes, they want red ribbon or holly berries or pale dried grasses or a glittery band of stars. And the particular butterfly you set in a poem, or the particular words for that butterfly, suggest who might be watching or running in another direction, or what could happen once the nets are put away. It doesn't much matter who or what inspired a poem, once I start keeping an eye out on where my own words might lead.
Soon I'll pick back up Ted Kooser's Poetry Repair Manual, and I think my favorite volume of his poems, Delights and Shadows. In the Judith Harris interview he speaks of its themes of delights in a field of darkness. "Every activity in life is undertaken with death observing from a distance… At so many feasts, we find ourselves setting a place for the dead – 'Oh, don't you wish Aunt Mabel were here?' – and the nearness of death lends the food savor."
And I'll wonder if I should trim the wreath on my door a bit more. Nah. My friend worried that the stuff on her leaner wreath would blow away.
My husband said, That's what's supposed to happen.
The world is windy. Dried grasses or blooms fall off, like memories or extraneous facts. But the green circle will hold for a while.
For more Poetry Friday posts, on Emily Dickinson's birthday, pour yourself more tea and visit: http://jamarattigan.livejournal.com/492549.html
December 9, 2010
The Net of History
Robert Frost remarked, or so I've read, that writing free verse is like playing tennis without a net. He wanted rhyme and meter to lend structure, which I totally get. But when people ask me why my verse doesn't use end of the line rhymes, I say that narrative poems give me structure enough. I want to tell a short story within one poem and link it to a longer story in others. Along with repeated imagery, that gives me enough sense of a frame.
Writing about history makes me consider two major audiences, while most are probably in the middle. One group knows little about the era I'm writing about, and I have to set a stage without making the furniture look obviously arranged. The group at the other end knows a lot, and anything that looks a smidge out of place may jar them from the dream a poem sets out to be. I have to teach a bit, but not look like I am, and I have to research like crazy to get the details right. Then get back to just what I want to say, which tends to be about anyone who might live at any time. Because with all the fading wallpaper or mud brick walls, ladder-back chairs or a rock in ancient Iraq, what I write is really about how nothing changes much. Over the years and centuries, people, I believe, are much like you and me. And that's what brings me back to my own shiny laptop on an old wooden desk.
Writing about history makes me consider two major audiences, while most are probably in the middle. One group knows little about the era I'm writing about, and I have to set a stage without making the furniture look obviously arranged. The group at the other end knows a lot, and anything that looks a smidge out of place may jar them from the dream a poem sets out to be. I have to teach a bit, but not look like I am, and I have to research like crazy to get the details right. Then get back to just what I want to say, which tends to be about anyone who might live at any time. Because with all the fading wallpaper or mud brick walls, ladder-back chairs or a rock in ancient Iraq, what I write is really about how nothing changes much. Over the years and centuries, people, I believe, are much like you and me. And that's what brings me back to my own shiny laptop on an old wooden desk.
December 8, 2010
The Strange World of Albrecht Durer
Yesterday Peter and I visited the Durer exhibit at the Sterling and Francine Clark Institute http://www.clarkart.edu in Williamstown, MA, which shows from Nov 13 to March 13, months when admission is quite stunningly free. I mean there was less than an inch of snow in the Berkshires, and that was off all the roads. Still the galleries were uncrowded, so Peter was leaning in to the works until I tugged him back, afraid the guard would yell at us for standing with nose perhaps an inch away from the glass. No sooner had I pulled him back, when a guard stepped forward and asked, "Would you like to use a magnifying glass? Some are in the next room."
We grabbed them, and the detail was even more breathtaking. I knew I'd be amazed by Durer (1471 – 1528), but I was thinking German Renaissance black and white woodcuts, prints, and etchings: this could be some work. What surprised me were the bits of affection throughout. I'm not saying Durer's view of the apocalypse is a walk in the park, but those are cool dragons, and you've got to like birds and cherubs with eyes peering from their arms or wings. I smiled over a corner in which a kid tries out stilts, and in "The Holy Family with Grasshopper," yes, there's an insect with wild knees posing with the holy ones.
And in the famous engraving of Adam and Eve, near their feet a cat snoozes near an alert mouse, and in the upper left a bearded goat perches on a cliff. "Like something out of Dr. Seuss," I said to Peter, who replied. "A lot reminds me of Seuss. The sometimes whimsical perspectives. And those creatures like the seven-headed beast." Yes, with crowns on both horns, and one head with gawky grin and another looping back under the strain of a sprawling neck.
In the engraving of Saint Jerome in His Study there's a skull on the window seat and no sense that the saint is writing something funny, but the expression on the lion's face is simply sweet. And such tenderness in the depiction of his paws and rumpled pillows, and the scissors, beads, brushes, and aren't those slippers kicked to the side? It made me happy.
If you can't catch this exhibit but want to know more about Durer and the printmaking process, the Clark website, with url above, has lots of information including an interesting video. And what's the take-away for me as a writer? I guess first, get to work. What Durer does in one piece, never mind a roomful, never mind a show-full, is amazing. But after that, there's the reminder to put a chubby kid maybe with crooked wings and collapsing stilts in the corner, especially when I'm going for dark. And there's nothing wrong with a smiling sleepy lion.
We grabbed them, and the detail was even more breathtaking. I knew I'd be amazed by Durer (1471 – 1528), but I was thinking German Renaissance black and white woodcuts, prints, and etchings: this could be some work. What surprised me were the bits of affection throughout. I'm not saying Durer's view of the apocalypse is a walk in the park, but those are cool dragons, and you've got to like birds and cherubs with eyes peering from their arms or wings. I smiled over a corner in which a kid tries out stilts, and in "The Holy Family with Grasshopper," yes, there's an insect with wild knees posing with the holy ones.
And in the famous engraving of Adam and Eve, near their feet a cat snoozes near an alert mouse, and in the upper left a bearded goat perches on a cliff. "Like something out of Dr. Seuss," I said to Peter, who replied. "A lot reminds me of Seuss. The sometimes whimsical perspectives. And those creatures like the seven-headed beast." Yes, with crowns on both horns, and one head with gawky grin and another looping back under the strain of a sprawling neck.
In the engraving of Saint Jerome in His Study there's a skull on the window seat and no sense that the saint is writing something funny, but the expression on the lion's face is simply sweet. And such tenderness in the depiction of his paws and rumpled pillows, and the scissors, beads, brushes, and aren't those slippers kicked to the side? It made me happy.
If you can't catch this exhibit but want to know more about Durer and the printmaking process, the Clark website, with url above, has lots of information including an interesting video. And what's the take-away for me as a writer? I guess first, get to work. What Durer does in one piece, never mind a roomful, never mind a show-full, is amazing. But after that, there's the reminder to put a chubby kid maybe with crooked wings and collapsing stilts in the corner, especially when I'm going for dark. And there's nothing wrong with a smiling sleepy lion.
December 6, 2010
Wreath Making
The last few days Peter clipped hemlock, spruce, pine, mountain laurel and a few dried plants and winterberry to balance the fragrant green. I was busy in the kitchen making cookies, with my computer on the table to edit during those ten minute baking times. And nothing got burned. Hard to tell which smells better, pine or madeleines, peanut butter, or almond jam cookies, but I was glad for a few days of the mix.
Today we're vacuuming prickly sofas (the dogs took good care of cookie crumbs) and have two wreaths on the door. I went for the bushy look.
And memories of sweet company leaving with their own amazing wreaths. My daughter won't get here until shortly before Christmas, but we were happy that Nelly, Em's friend since kindergarten, now a senior at UMass, came to make one wreath for her apartment and one for her mom.
Also representing the younger more glamorous generation, Rosa took the train from New York with her friend Dilini to cook and make a wreath: I hope all the train-riders going back last night appreciated the glimpse of glitter and woodsy smell!
Peter took too many good pictures to post, but I'm especially fond of this one of Bruce (right) who's in my writing group, with Joe, whose wreath seems to show the celebratory spirit we all feel as he faced down a major health challenge this year.
Wishing such joy to you all! Now I'm ready for snow.
Today we're vacuuming prickly sofas (the dogs took good care of cookie crumbs) and have two wreaths on the door. I went for the bushy look.
And memories of sweet company leaving with their own amazing wreaths. My daughter won't get here until shortly before Christmas, but we were happy that Nelly, Em's friend since kindergarten, now a senior at UMass, came to make one wreath for her apartment and one for her mom.
Also representing the younger more glamorous generation, Rosa took the train from New York with her friend Dilini to cook and make a wreath: I hope all the train-riders going back last night appreciated the glimpse of glitter and woodsy smell!
Peter took too many good pictures to post, but I'm especially fond of this one of Bruce (right) who's in my writing group, with Joe, whose wreath seems to show the celebratory spirit we all feel as he faced down a major health challenge this year.
Wishing such joy to you all! Now I'm ready for snow.
December 3, 2010
A Pocketful of Posies by Salley Mavor
Last night I was poring through Salley Mavor's A Pocketful of Posies, which I'd picked up for a present. I'm sure my favorite one year old friend won't mind me previewing. While the familiar verses rang in my head, I murmured, "This is so cute. Oh, this is so sweet. " Admiring the stitches on a little lamb's leg, the elegant embroidering on a tree's branches, I couldn't help saying, "Oh, my gosh."
"Is that how you're going to write a review?" my husband asked.
"Um, yes."
Really, all I wanted to do was stare and delight at this large book, which gives you so much more detail than you can see here in a few pictures from Salley Mavor's blog http://weefolk.wordpress.com/ which I urge you to visit to make your own contented murmurs and squeals. She collects things, cuts hand-dyed felt, does her own fastidious stitching before photographing the results that illustrate Mother Goose, about whom Muriel Rukeyser wrote: ''We come to language through her, and to mystery and laughter and action. To poetry.''
There are many wonderful nursery rhyme collections, but the whimsy and care makes this introduction special. And might encourage a child -- or you -- to pick up needle and thread and maybe one day appear on Project Runway. Or sew an acorn doll or apron. The care in every stitch is pure delight, and there are no shortcuts. The particular leaves and lambs on the end-papers were individually done, not photoshopped to repeat patterns. Look at this Little Boy Blue. And a sheep. We see lots of animals, often playfully roaming in circles: a design choice that echoes the ring-around-the-rosie theme of more than that rhyme. I like seeing houses stand on their sides or heads.
Here's a picture from Salley Mavor's show of original fabric relief illustrations in the children's gallery at the Danforth Museum in Framingham, MA http://danforthmuseum.org/salley_mavor.html
which will be displayed until January 23rd, 2011.
For more Poetry Friday posts, please visit: http://missrumphiuseffect.blogspot.com/2010/12/poetry-friday-is-here.html
"Is that how you're going to write a review?" my husband asked.
"Um, yes."
Really, all I wanted to do was stare and delight at this large book, which gives you so much more detail than you can see here in a few pictures from Salley Mavor's blog http://weefolk.wordpress.com/ which I urge you to visit to make your own contented murmurs and squeals. She collects things, cuts hand-dyed felt, does her own fastidious stitching before photographing the results that illustrate Mother Goose, about whom Muriel Rukeyser wrote: ''We come to language through her, and to mystery and laughter and action. To poetry.''
There are many wonderful nursery rhyme collections, but the whimsy and care makes this introduction special. And might encourage a child -- or you -- to pick up needle and thread and maybe one day appear on Project Runway. Or sew an acorn doll or apron. The care in every stitch is pure delight, and there are no shortcuts. The particular leaves and lambs on the end-papers were individually done, not photoshopped to repeat patterns. Look at this Little Boy Blue. And a sheep. We see lots of animals, often playfully roaming in circles: a design choice that echoes the ring-around-the-rosie theme of more than that rhyme. I like seeing houses stand on their sides or heads.
Here's a picture from Salley Mavor's show of original fabric relief illustrations in the children's gallery at the Danforth Museum in Framingham, MA http://danforthmuseum.org/salley_mavor.html
which will be displayed until January 23rd, 2011.
For more Poetry Friday posts, please visit: http://missrumphiuseffect.blogspot.com/2010/12/poetry-friday-is-here.html
November 30, 2010
Nose Close to Paper
Most of us who've been in any kind of writing workshop where work is read aloud have been asked to "Just read, please." No introduction beyond the title, except perhaps the genre, and certainly no apologies. And most of us have seen people who couldn't help themselves. There's a flurry of back story that rises like smoke we try to wave away as we wait for words on a page. The explanations don't have much to do with the tale that follows. Usually they come from anxiety, which often has nothing to do with the confidence or lack of it on the language on paper. The explanation just distracts.
For the past month, anything I could say about my writing process feels like that kind of puff or fluff, though often before trying to create a view of what I was doing has been helpful to me and fun. I think I'll get back to that. Maybe I'm feeling superstitious. Right now I feel I'm on a good path, but worry that if I pull up my head and look around, I might think: uh oh. So I'll go back to peering close to the page. It's the quiet part of writing. Past the whirlwind and questions of a beginning, when I might want to brainstorm with others, but not so polished that I'm looking for readers. It's the part where one sentence kind of dictates the next and I'm listening with all ears.
For the past month, anything I could say about my writing process feels like that kind of puff or fluff, though often before trying to create a view of what I was doing has been helpful to me and fun. I think I'll get back to that. Maybe I'm feeling superstitious. Right now I feel I'm on a good path, but worry that if I pull up my head and look around, I might think: uh oh. So I'll go back to peering close to the page. It's the quiet part of writing. Past the whirlwind and questions of a beginning, when I might want to brainstorm with others, but not so polished that I'm looking for readers. It's the part where one sentence kind of dictates the next and I'm listening with all ears.
November 24, 2010
Thanksgiving Wishes
There's pumpkin bread to make, a turkey to defrost, kitchen counters to clear, and a poem to shape up, but I wanted to wish everyone a happy Thanksgiving. I've been away from the blog this week seeing my cousin Megan and her daughter, Rachel, my daughter Emily and her roommate Colleen. Emily arranged a supper so we could meet her wonderful bosses at Organically Grown. She, Peter, and I also visited the San Diego Zoo.
While Em worked, Peter and I toured Balboa Park in San Diego. At the science museum we saw the biggest ammonites I've ever seen, some imprinted with gorgeous fern patterns. At the Air and Space museum, we saw lots of cool aircraft and a little boy dressed as Bat Man twirling around. It was warm enough to eat breakfast outdoors, and one day I spotted a little girl wearing silver shoes bending over a plant say, "Mama, I see the morning mist." It's a joy to see the ocean, and the great Pacific lets you watch the sun set over it. Wishing all of you its peace as I savor my blessings of family, friends, the gorgeous world, and memories.
While Em worked, Peter and I toured Balboa Park in San Diego. At the science museum we saw the biggest ammonites I've ever seen, some imprinted with gorgeous fern patterns. At the Air and Space museum, we saw lots of cool aircraft and a little boy dressed as Bat Man twirling around. It was warm enough to eat breakfast outdoors, and one day I spotted a little girl wearing silver shoes bending over a plant say, "Mama, I see the morning mist." It's a joy to see the ocean, and the great Pacific lets you watch the sun set over it. Wishing all of you its peace as I savor my blessings of family, friends, the gorgeous world, and memories.
November 15, 2010
Images Holding Stories
I've always liked to stare at things and wonder if they have some meaning, so thank goodness writing gives me an excuse. Drafting Mary Anning and the Sea Dragon http://www.jeannineatkins.com/books/mary_anning.htm, I spent a long time with the single sketch of Mary made during her lifetime: a woman in baggy overcoat and a top hat staring at the ground, which of course, this pioneering fossil hunter was to find, held some secrets of the universe. I had to study a bit of paleontology, but also just spend time looking at pictures. That top hat, which protected Mary's head from falling rocks, but may have embarrassed her as a girl when her parents insisted she wear it, gave me a frame for the picture book.
Now I'm writing poems set in the nineteenth century, about another girl who, like Mary, left few notes. So I linger over artifacts, read more books about the time and place than what intrepid biographers have managed to cobble together. Lately I've been reading herbals and almanacs to know what might have been in some gardens she weeded, and these plants start telling stories of their own. The Frugal Housewife by Lydia Maria Childs, printed in multiple editions, tells me what a house was supposed to look like, and by default, what most probably didn't. These kitchens with pickles or potatoes getting too soft (if you don't heed Mrs. Childs) and darkened parlors (you don't want the fabric to fade) give me stuff for poems. I'm working with big historical moments, too, but it's not the message of parades I'm often after, but kind of watching a child among the knees. What might she find on the cobblestones?
Of course I need character and a plot line to pull everything together, but situations do arise out of the particular places and what might be found on kitchen tables or bureaus. Composing is going pretty well, and I thank again the busy writers of November for helping to make nice winds to work in. And of course it's a season to be cozy. Jama's![[info]](https://i.gr-assets.com/images/S/compressed.photo.goodreads.com/hostedimages/1380442897i/1319734.gif)
jamarattigan
handing out chocolate cake today, but I'll offer my new favorite tea which Peter brought home to skeptical me. It goes beyond hints of vanilla and nutmeg. Of course it's not the real thing, but I don't really miss the thickness, and it's zero calories until you add, which you must, the milk.
Now I'm writing poems set in the nineteenth century, about another girl who, like Mary, left few notes. So I linger over artifacts, read more books about the time and place than what intrepid biographers have managed to cobble together. Lately I've been reading herbals and almanacs to know what might have been in some gardens she weeded, and these plants start telling stories of their own. The Frugal Housewife by Lydia Maria Childs, printed in multiple editions, tells me what a house was supposed to look like, and by default, what most probably didn't. These kitchens with pickles or potatoes getting too soft (if you don't heed Mrs. Childs) and darkened parlors (you don't want the fabric to fade) give me stuff for poems. I'm working with big historical moments, too, but it's not the message of parades I'm often after, but kind of watching a child among the knees. What might she find on the cobblestones?
Of course I need character and a plot line to pull everything together, but situations do arise out of the particular places and what might be found on kitchen tables or bureaus. Composing is going pretty well, and I thank again the busy writers of November for helping to make nice winds to work in. And of course it's a season to be cozy. Jama's
jamarattigan
handing out chocolate cake today, but I'll offer my new favorite tea which Peter brought home to skeptical me. It goes beyond hints of vanilla and nutmeg. Of course it's not the real thing, but I don't really miss the thickness, and it's zero calories until you add, which you must, the milk.
November 12, 2010
Thankfulness on a Friday
I missed my alliterative chance on Thursday, but I'm brimming with thanks today. So Thankful Thursday does a mash-up with Friday Five.
1. I'm thrilled that Borrowed Names is being considered for the Cybils Poetry Award. And how kind of them to post a review from Laura Purdie Salas.
2. Sara Lewis Holmes http://saralewisholmes.blogspot.com/2010/11/poetry-friday-and-what-im-reading-now.html blogs today about how reading poetry, specifically Borrowed Names, helps her while revising. I agree it's a great genre to go to when you don't want to get all lost and off track in a big novel, but need a bit more than say newspapers for your word fix.
3. Generous Elaine Magliaro http://wildrosereader.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2010-11-03T15%3A01%3A00-05%3A00 interviewed legendary poet and anthologist Lee Bennett Hopkins, and also offered a chance for anyone to pose questions. Not only did we get answers, but one lucky participant, which turned out to be me, won one of Lee's books. I blogged about Sharing the Seasons, and will be happy to have an inscribed copy of this anthology. Here's a picture of Elaine and Lee from the NCTE convention last year.
4. The students in my writing class at the Art Studio http://www.art-studio.org/ make me smile. Josh with his enthusiasm for haiku in its myriad forms. Emily with her sweetness and slanting rhymes. Simone's homage to the wreck of a Barbie doll. Rachel's passion for self expression, even by way of zombies. Jean-Marc's sense of direction: my guess is he plays chess. Ian's determination to get things right. Here are a few of the questions they thought good to ask of their characters: Do you have more of a nice side? How does your mind work? If you had only 24 hours left to live, what would you do? Would you kill someone for one million? Did you get me a present? Have you forgiven yourself for what you've done?
5. I'm thankful for plain old moving forward with the writing. Not to say there aren't twists and turns and moving backwards. But words are stacking up in their slow un-showy way, and I don't take the muse, who I know can be fickle or finicky, for granted.
I'm sorry not to be participating in Poetry Friday today, but there are some great poems and thoughts to be found at the roundup here: http://childrens-literacy.com/2010/11/11/poetry-friday-lots-of-dots-and-a-roundup-too/
Have a great weekend, and if you're a writer, I hope your characters bring you presents!
1. I'm thrilled that Borrowed Names is being considered for the Cybils Poetry Award. And how kind of them to post a review from Laura Purdie Salas.
2. Sara Lewis Holmes http://saralewisholmes.blogspot.com/2010/11/poetry-friday-and-what-im-reading-now.html blogs today about how reading poetry, specifically Borrowed Names, helps her while revising. I agree it's a great genre to go to when you don't want to get all lost and off track in a big novel, but need a bit more than say newspapers for your word fix.
3. Generous Elaine Magliaro http://wildrosereader.blogspot.com/search?updated-max=2010-11-03T15%3A01%3A00-05%3A00 interviewed legendary poet and anthologist Lee Bennett Hopkins, and also offered a chance for anyone to pose questions. Not only did we get answers, but one lucky participant, which turned out to be me, won one of Lee's books. I blogged about Sharing the Seasons, and will be happy to have an inscribed copy of this anthology. Here's a picture of Elaine and Lee from the NCTE convention last year.
4. The students in my writing class at the Art Studio http://www.art-studio.org/ make me smile. Josh with his enthusiasm for haiku in its myriad forms. Emily with her sweetness and slanting rhymes. Simone's homage to the wreck of a Barbie doll. Rachel's passion for self expression, even by way of zombies. Jean-Marc's sense of direction: my guess is he plays chess. Ian's determination to get things right. Here are a few of the questions they thought good to ask of their characters: Do you have more of a nice side? How does your mind work? If you had only 24 hours left to live, what would you do? Would you kill someone for one million? Did you get me a present? Have you forgiven yourself for what you've done?
5. I'm thankful for plain old moving forward with the writing. Not to say there aren't twists and turns and moving backwards. But words are stacking up in their slow un-showy way, and I don't take the muse, who I know can be fickle or finicky, for granted.
I'm sorry not to be participating in Poetry Friday today, but there are some great poems and thoughts to be found at the roundup here: http://childrens-literacy.com/2010/11/11/poetry-friday-lots-of-dots-and-a-roundup-too/
Have a great weekend, and if you're a writer, I hope your characters bring you presents!
November 7, 2010
Cheering for the Diligent Dashers of November
I like the way some writers are racking up words through this month that can be dreary, pressing their noses close to paper when the world is offering fewer dazzlements, at least here in Massachusetts. Most bright leaves have fallen, and it's too early to put up the bird feeders: we wait until hungry bears are hibernating. The month between pumpkins on porches and lights strung from bushes is a good time for words, and thousands of people from around the world have signed on for National Novel Writing Month: http://www.nanowrimo.org/ Our Jo
jbknowles
welcomes people for perhaps a more generous, gentler – though still wildly ambitious -- version. Here http://community.livejournal.com/jonowrimo/ one can find revise or tweak while still dashing ahead.
Close to home, some friends including Dina Friedman http://ddinafriedman.com/ and Ellen Wittlinger http://www.ellenwittlinger.com/ are writing 30 Poems in Thirty Days to benefit literacy efforts at the Center for New Americans http://www.facebook.com/pages/Northampton-MA/Center-For-New-Americans/125663334711 Dina participated in this fundraiser last year and found that writing poetry daily both loosened her up and made her more attentive to the music in her fiction. And we got to read some wonderful fresh poems.
Then there's the cool plan to write thirty ideas for picture books in thirty days. http://taralazar.wordpress.com/2010/10/30/piboidmo-2010-kick-off/ Not only did Tara choose a nice logo, but there are contests, prizes, and guest bloggers to inspire. I expect writing even one not-so-brilliant idea then another and another might trigger a great one, and several good ideas might start to blend into something amazing as the days pass.
I believe part of our writing brain can be seduced or tricked by moving hands, see those as a beckoning to work without regard to the quality of what's coming out; then those words may get better from sheer volume, or they will when one eventually switches back to focus on quality over quantity, or what we call revision. But I'm cheering from the bleachers, feeling tortoise-like as I stick to my own everyday goals. Accepting my slow pace is sometimes hard – I'd like to be more prolific -- but it's also what allows me to write poetry. Still, there's something to be said for going against our instincts from time to time, and knowing others are writing a novel in a month, even bad ones, reminds me that haste has its gifts. Speeding instead of lingering, changing my speed dial, can take me to new places. In haste we bump into things, and make connections.
So I'm shouting Go! Go! to my friends, and giving myself a small nudge and a whisper to kick it up a notch. My muse may be a sluggish girl, unimpressed by deadlines, but there come times when every tortoise should put on bunny ears and hustle, stirring up the leaves.
jbknowles
welcomes people for perhaps a more generous, gentler – though still wildly ambitious -- version. Here http://community.livejournal.com/jonowrimo/ one can find revise or tweak while still dashing ahead. Close to home, some friends including Dina Friedman http://ddinafriedman.com/ and Ellen Wittlinger http://www.ellenwittlinger.com/ are writing 30 Poems in Thirty Days to benefit literacy efforts at the Center for New Americans http://www.facebook.com/pages/Northampton-MA/Center-For-New-Americans/125663334711 Dina participated in this fundraiser last year and found that writing poetry daily both loosened her up and made her more attentive to the music in her fiction. And we got to read some wonderful fresh poems.
Then there's the cool plan to write thirty ideas for picture books in thirty days. http://taralazar.wordpress.com/2010/10/30/piboidmo-2010-kick-off/ Not only did Tara choose a nice logo, but there are contests, prizes, and guest bloggers to inspire. I expect writing even one not-so-brilliant idea then another and another might trigger a great one, and several good ideas might start to blend into something amazing as the days pass.
I believe part of our writing brain can be seduced or tricked by moving hands, see those as a beckoning to work without regard to the quality of what's coming out; then those words may get better from sheer volume, or they will when one eventually switches back to focus on quality over quantity, or what we call revision. But I'm cheering from the bleachers, feeling tortoise-like as I stick to my own everyday goals. Accepting my slow pace is sometimes hard – I'd like to be more prolific -- but it's also what allows me to write poetry. Still, there's something to be said for going against our instincts from time to time, and knowing others are writing a novel in a month, even bad ones, reminds me that haste has its gifts. Speeding instead of lingering, changing my speed dial, can take me to new places. In haste we bump into things, and make connections.
So I'm shouting Go! Go! to my friends, and giving myself a small nudge and a whisper to kick it up a notch. My muse may be a sluggish girl, unimpressed by deadlines, but there come times when every tortoise should put on bunny ears and hustle, stirring up the leaves.
