Clifford Garstang's Blog, page 175

VCCA Report, Day 3

On Sunday morning we woke up to ice everywhere. Breakfast was limited--the kitchen regulars couldn't get in--and it was even tricky making the short walk out to the studios. After the sleet stopped, it rained. And rained. And rained. Which should have been conducive to work, but it just made me sleepy. Still, I got some work done.

In the evening we went over to Sweetbriar for the annual holiday dinner put on by the Dining Services there -- turkey, ham, all the fixings. We ate too much. Some of...

VCCA Report, Day 2

It was nice to see Chef Rhonda at dinner Friday night. She has made such a difference here! After dinner, there was a Fellows reading. First Ruth Kessler read some poems, including a couple of ekphrastic pieces, always appropriate when there are visual artists in the audience. And Patrick Somerville, author of the novel Cradle which came out this year, read from the new novel he's working on. People stayed around in the living room after that, but I headed back to my studio for more work.

My t...

VCCA Report, Day 1

I'm rewarding myself with a little internet break! I got here Thursday morning, after a beautiful drive over the mountain. I spent the afternoon organizing my studio and planning the work ahead. Some of those plans are just a schedule--how much progress I need to make each day--and some was a list of issues that I know I need to address in the current draft. (Name changes, tropes, inconsistencies, etc.) I should have had that done already, before coming to VCCA, but, well, I didn't. So I got ...

Do you know the way to VCCA?

I'm off to VCCA today. That's the Virginia Center for the Creative Arts, an incredible retreat for artists. "Retreat" never sounds right, though, because my visits there always provide me with a leap in productivity. No distractions--if I can keep my hands of the damn internet--and a wonderful, creative environment.

I'm near the end of my novel, and that's what I plan to work on there. I've got a complete draft--my fourth or so--and plans for what I do to complete it. Wish me luck!

NEA Literature Fellowships (Prose)

Congratulations to the recipients of the 2010 Literature Fellowships (Prose), especially my friends on the list. It's a great honor (and also a tidy, helpful sum of money).

The New Yorker: "All That" by David Foster Wallace

Is it safe to assume that this "story" is an excerpt from David Foster Wallace's posthumous novel, The Pale King, due out in 2011? The voice seems consistent with other snippets of the novel I've seen, so even though The New Yorker doesn't tell us this (they never do), that's the theory I'm running with.

In which case, it doesn't matter that this piece, as interesting as it is, doesn't work as a story. Having said that, it's enormously entertaining, in a David Foster Wallace sort of way. The n...

Big Blend Magazine

I am featured today in Big Blend Magazine, and if you scroll down to the bottom, just to the right of my picture, you can listen to me being interviewed by the hosts of Champagne Sundays (Big Blend Radio), Nancy and Lisa.

Beg, Borrow, Steal by Michael Greenberg

Beg, Borrow, Steal – A Writer's Life
Michael Greenberg
Other Press, 2009

Many readers are likely to come to this book having read the Michael Greenberg's much-lauded Hurry Down Sunshine, a 2008 memoir about his daughter's breakdown. I haven't read that book, but now that I've read Beg, Borrow, Steal I almost certainly will. He's an engaging writer, with a style and approach that admit the existence of other people and the world around him. In other words, he's not, at least in this book, the sel...

The Literacy Site

Do you click every day? I do. First thing in the morning, I go The Literacy Site and click and then click on its affiliated sites: The Hunger Site, The Breast Cancer Site, The Child Health Site, The Rainforest Site, and The Animal Rescue Site. The whole process takes less than a minute and at no other cost to me I've contributed to all six important causes. I even get a reminder by email each weekday, with a link that makes getting started easy.

Click on the logo above, or go here:
Click here...

Nice Words About In an Uncharted Country

Author Jana McBurney-Lin has some nice things to say about In an Uncharted Country at her blog: My Half of the Sky (which is also the title of her terrific novel set in Southern China).