Beth Kephart's Blog, page 335

readergirlz writing contest (2): the story song winner (2)

The second winner of the readergirlz story song contest is Rachel L., who brought us a lyric called "Strength."

Strength

To stand as stone; to sing as wind.
To call your name; to let me in.

With flame and ice and skin aglow,
Those eyes that crackle; those tears like snow.

The heart that's stronger
Than the oak's wide frame;
The lips that call

And those that came.


Choreography Explanation: When I get an idea for a piece of writing, usually it comes in the form of a single image. Then I take the image...

Shelf Elf reviews Nothing but Ghosts

As those who read this blog know well, Nothing but Ghosts was written in the wake of my own mother's passing—inspired by the finch, the fox, and the songs that edged near to assure me that her spirit was yet within reach. Much of the book takes place in a fictionalized version of Chanticleer, the pleasure garden. In this photograph, the great katsura tree rises over a bench a gardener made, and those who sit there can look out over Doug's cutting garden and the wild profusion of asparagus. ...

This Happened

The rain came and came. I might have gone out, but I stayed in. I sat on the couch and not at my desk, and I closed my eyes, and I thought. The issue was, How will I finish this novel I'm writing? What is the final scene, and how do I get there?

I hadn't asked before because I needed not to know. I needed the making of this novel to be urgent, powered by wanting, by uneasiness, angst. I needed to wake to not knowing, to that desire to find out, and I did, I woke to that, but most days I ...

readergirlz writing contest (2): the story song winner

The second readergirlz contest asked writers to think out loud about the way their own work is choreographed—how it moves across the page, and from sound toward meaning. Our winner is Q. Here is her poem, and her reasoning. Q receives a signed copy of House of Dance.





Tinged with regret

The girl in the bus

window

sees me on a park bench,

me with all my waiting and

watching her,

too.



I might have known her

once,

and I wonder if she saw me

for who I was,

for who I am,

or for who I'd like...

readergirlz writing contest (3): then and now

Two winners have been selected for the October readergirlz writing challenge, and their work will be posted shortly. In the meantime, I'm happy to unveil the third challenge of four, a contest I've called "Then and Now." Here we go:

In this readergirlz challenge, the premise is simple (and does not involve a video). Find a photograph of yourself as a young child on the verge of some new knowledge or turning point. Write a paragraph about that photograph/that moment in present tense, as if...

English 145 (5):

I arrived at the Penn campus early yesterday, first to have tea with Gregory Djanikian, a poet, a mentor, and the director of the creative writing staff. We talked of students and what might be yielded to them, talked of what remains, or should. We walked, then, to the eastern wedge of the campus, where Greg has a standing Monday squash game, and where I, by virtue of proximity to a once-familiar structure, remembered my own days on the varsity team.

I said goodbye to Greg, then met Jay Kirk...

In the end, what does it mean?

The thing about making yourself vulnerable in a discipline you'll never own is that you don't go out and do it alone. When you dance, for example, before a few hundred people on a Sunday afternoon on a stage, it's not the steps that matter in the end, not really. It's Annika and Monika, who arrive early, with all their enthusiasms, and love. It's those who stand on the margins of the stage, calling your name as you whisk by. It's your Broadway partner, Jean, who looks you in the eyes as y...

Some of Each, in a Rain Storm

Throughout the long pour-down of rain yesterday, I travel. First, in the dark of pre-dawn, I travel a dreamscape, write to page 246 of this new adult novel of mine. It's a number bearing no actual significance, save that there, within page 245, are the seeds of the novel's ending, a turning toward, a knowing that, someday, I'll finish this—a fact I would not have bet on until yesterday's strum-beat of rain. Mid-morning Body Pump at the gym with friends is a journey away from me, my mind. ...

Writing by the Numbers/Twin Stories

On October 19th, The New Yorker published a piece by Rebecca Mead called "The Gossip Mill." Subtitled, "Alloy, the teen-entertainment factory," the piece revealed the behind-the-scenes machinations of the company that packages approximately 30 teen-oriented books each year, while also scouring the what if? horizon for new TV and feature film projects. Alloy is indeed a factory. Its products are designed to sell, built to please, crafted with an insider's understanding of what teens really w...

The Drexel InterView: Beth Kephart and Paula Marantz Cohen

A few weeks ago, I prematurely loaded this brief excerpt from a much-longer interview conducted by the extraordinarily gracious Paula Marantz Cohen on behalf of The Drexel InterView, a nationally distributed cable show. My thanks to Lynn Levin for clearing the way for this permanent posting.

The conversation was held last autumn. During this segment I speak of the blog, the dance world, and next projects. I had not yet started on the book that preoccupies me now when this taping took place....