Chitra Banerjee Divakaruni's Blog, page 9

Beginning All Over Again

The new semester started this week at the University of Houston, where I teach, and yesterday I met my first class, a Master Fiction Workshop. Often, the Master Workshop is the final class that our graduate students take before they do their thesis/dissertation defense, and by this point most of them are mature writers with a draft of their novel or short story collection. This year all the students have novels, so we will also be reading, side by side, published novels that I have assigned t...

Beginning All Over Again

The new semester started this week at the University of Houston, where I teach, and yesterday I met my first class, a Master Fiction Workshop. Often, the Master Workshop is the final class that our graduate students take before they do their thesis/dissertation defense, and by this point most of them are mature writers with a draft of their novel or short story collection. This year all the students have novels, so we will also be reading, side by side, published novels that I have assigned them

Driving Lessons

One of my favorite quotes is from the movie The Journey, directed by Harish Saluja: Life Gets in the Way of Art. Every year I warn my graduate students in the Creative Writing program at the University of Houston to be prepared for unexpected busyness that will sabotage our writing. Well, humblingly, that's what has been happening to me this summer, with a son getting ready to leave for college, and another one learning to drive, and one of them joining a breakdance group, and both of them de...

Driving Lessons

One of my favorite quotes is from the movie The Journey, directed by Harish Saluja: Life Gets in the Way of Art. Every year I warn my graduate students in the Creative Writing program at the University of Houston to be prepared for unexpected busyness that will sabotage our writing. Well, humblingly, that's what has been happening to me this summer, with a son getting ready to leave for college, and another one learning to drive, and one of them joining a breakdance group, and both of them decid

Tofusion

Apologies for the long gap between entries. I was finishing  my novel, One Amazing Thing, literally working on it day and night. Everything else fell by the wayside. It was intense. My  family lived on sandwiches and pizza. (I suspect the boys didn't mind the pizza bit too much).

But now that the household is slowly being restored to normal and I'm back in the kitchen, I thought I'd indulge in vanity and share with you a fusion tofu dish that I created. As with most of my cooking, it's very easy

Tofusion

Apologies for the long gap between entries. I was finishing  my novel, One Amazing Thing, literally working on it day and night. Everything else fell by the wayside. It was intense. My  family lived on sandwiches and pizza. (I suspect the boys didn't mind the pizza bit too much).

But now that the household is slowly being restored to normal and I'm back in the kitchen, I thought I'd indulge in vanity and share with you a fusion tofu dish that I created. As with most of my cooking, it's very easy

Writers in the Schools

The Writers in the Schools program (Houston) sent me this lovely poem by 4th grader Cody:

Ink Heart

What the night hides:/
a stranger in the dark,/
 fire and stars, /
snakes and thorns,/
 a house full of books,/
a night full of words,/
the lion's den,/
going farther south.

Love that last enigmatic line, Cody!

Folks, were you writing like that in 4th grade? I certainly wasn't!

Check out WITS' great program with inner city kids and others
at www.witshouston.org

Writers in the Schools

The Writers in the Schools program (Houston) sent me this lovely poem by 4th grader Cody:

Ink Heart

What the night hides:/
a stranger in the dark,/
 fire and stars, /
snakes and thorns,/
 a house full of books,/
a night full of words,/
the lion's den,/
going farther south.

Love that last enigmatic line, Cody!

Folks, were you writing like that in 4th grade? I certainly wasn't!

Check out WITS' great program with inner city kids and others
at www.witshouston.org

To Celebrate National Poetry Month. . .

Here are some poems by the Zen master Ryokan, one of my favorites:

How can we ever lose interest in
life?
Spring has come again
And cherry trees bloom in the mountains.

****

I came to this village to see the peach blossoms
but spent the day instead
Looking at the flowers along the river bank.

*****

O that my priest's robe were wide enough
to gather up all the suffering people
in this floating world.

****

Finshing a day of begging
I return home through the green mountains.
The setting sun is hidden behind th

To Celebrate National Poetry Month. . .

Here are some poems by the Zen master Ryokan, one of my favorites:

How can we ever lose interest in
life?
Spring has come again
And cherry trees bloom in the mountains.

****

I came to this village to see the peach blossoms
but spent the day instead
Looking at the flowers along the river bank.

*****

O that my priest's robe were wide enough
to gather up all the suffering people
in this floating world.

****

Finshing a day of begging
I return home through the green mountains.
The setting sun is hidden behind t