In today’s Craft Book Spotlight, The Writer magazine gave our very own all-faculty compilation, Alchemy of the Word, a nice shout-out: “When National Book Award winner and acclaimed memoirist Maxine Hong Kingston praises a book, you sit up and pay attention. “Whether you’re a young beginner or a veteran writer like me, you’ll get support… Continue reading Alchemy of the Word News
Tag: reading
Emails to a Young Writer, or I Am Not Friedrich Nietzsche:
On Writers, Writer’s Block, Generosity, Creativity and Community
Notebook
The paragraph or so of writing in preparation for this post I began on an empty page of an old, located notebook, one that flips vertically like a police ticket or meter maid book, but unlike law enforcement trappings
MFAW-WA Faculty Member Keenan Norris’s Article on Micheline Aharonian Marcom
MFAW-WA faculty member Keenan Norris has interviewed another MFAW-WA faculty member Micheline Aharonian Marcom about her work as Creative Director of the New American Story Project (NASP). The NASP is a collaboration of artists presenting oral histories and stories of immigrants and refugees in order to bear witness, raise awareness, and provoke transformative conversation. Here’s the… Continue reading MFAW-WA Faculty Member Keenan Norris’s Article on Micheline Aharonian Marcom
Writing By the Seat of Your Pants
Lately I’ve been thinking a lot about thrillers. About why recently I’ve been reading them compulsively at all hours of the day and night. Maybe the subject for a new book? I’m thinking about that. In the meantime I devour them at a great rate.
MFAW-VT Faculty Member Douglas A. Martin Interview
The Creative Independent, “a growing resource of emotional and practical guidance for creative people,” featured MFAW-VT faculty member Douglas A. Martin in their Sunday Edition Interview. Here is a taste: “My book began its life as a dissertation. My approach was something like “I’m only going to write a dissertation in a particular way. It is not going… Continue reading MFAW-VT Faculty Member Douglas A. Martin Interview
Graduating MFAW Student Ian August Wins the Garry Marshall Theatre’s New Works Festival Prize!!
MFAW-VT Student–but just days away from turning into an alum–Ian August’s play INTERVIEWESE, is a winner of the Garry Marshall Theatre’s New Works Festival and will be getting a public reading on May 30th, directed by Carolyn Hennesy (General Hospital, Cougar Town). Ian will be going to L.A. for this one, so if any Goddard folks are in Los… Continue reading Graduating MFAW Student Ian August Wins the Garry Marshall Theatre’s New Works Festival Prize!!
On Writing, Politics, and the Tarot
What do writing, politics and the Tarot have in common? On November 7th, 2017, I was elected Town Supervisor of Pine Plains, New York.
Doing Laundry with Hannibal Lecter
Do you suppose Hannibal Lecter does his own laundry? It’s easy to see a white collar criminal doctor sending his whites out to be dry cleaned and pressed by an efficiently outsourced place with pink boxes. But I imagine, what with the blood stains and all, doing it himself is a better plan. So there he is in the basement—or, I guess he has one of those fancy laundry rooms on an upper floor with sunny yellow walls and a sign that says “Wash. Dry. Fold. Repeat.”— sorting whites and red and pulling out the bleach and hoping it doesn’t ruin his favorite sweater…
Kenny Fries Visiting Writer
MFAW-VT faculty member Kenny Fries will be Visiting Writer at King’s College in Wilkes-Barre, PA next week. During his time at King’s, Kenny will meet with faculty and students, visit two writing classes, and give a public reading on April 17, 7:30pm, Burke Auditorium, McGowan School of Business. Previous visiting writers at King’s have included Michael… Continue reading Kenny Fries Visiting Writer
MFAW-VT Faculty Member Douglas A. Martin: “Queer Narratives & Methods”
MFAW-VT Faculty Member Douglas A. Martin will be read and talk with Andrew Durbin on “Queer Narratives & Methods” on Thursday, April 5th, for CLAGS: Center for LGBTQ Studies at the CUNY Graduate Center, 365 Fifth Avenue, Room 9205, in New York City. The program starts at 6:30pm.
Dear Books,
Dear Books,
From the moment my father gave me Go Tell It on the Mountain and told me,
“Read this and you’ll know more about who I am,”
I knew one thing was inescapable:
I would need to read that book, get back to him about it, and keep on reading and reading—
My Smarter Wiser Super-Sexy Personal Echo
Though the newest version of the Echo is decent, you can get a better response to life if you use your own voice—i.e. the Personal Echo. The Personal Echo is in high demand because it offers the gift of someone else controlling your life, but doing it in a way that feels as if you are talking to yourself. And truly, what writer wouldn’t want that?
To Blog or Not To Blog
To blog or not to blog–that is the question, writers. Whether it is nobler to essay than to blog is a serious matter, and not everyone can do it or do it well.Because to do it well, one must face the truth of blogging and accept it: it’s a genre. It has rules. It requires… attention to craft.
On Language, On Sophisticated Style
I am an unabashed Language Freak. Word Freak. Sentence Freak. Grammar and Punctuation Freak. I am deeply in love with what William Golding called “that massive instrument” the English language. For me putting words down on paper is like playing a finely tuned piano. No wrong notes, please! My instrument is too precious to misuse.
A Holiday Potluck of Literature
Welcome to a table piled with a potluck of literature. If you think about it, all writers and readers are connected by our own ancient internet of literature.
packing up my summer book: 20 lines
There is a stack of summer books on the floor still to return to the library, that have reached their renewal limit, overdue.
Letter from London: Reflections on Writers’ Reputations, Graves, Love Affairs, Accents, and a Murder, in No Particular Order
Moving back to London requires minimal adjustment, it’s as easy (as a writer once said about revision, compared to first draft composing) as sliding into a bath of warm oatmeal. No culture shock save for the first instant of wondering why dogs and babies are driving cars; all you have to do is exercise a little preliminary caution crossing the street and you’re done. Or maybe some mild culture shock, over here in the Land of Other People’s Problems, to learn exactly what the tabloid media judges important. “Horror on No. 77!” shrieks the top headline in the Evening Standard, the free newspaper everyone reads on the Tube going home after work.
By Way of the Author’s Voice
I wanted to open the valise of what could not make the trip into English. I wanted to hear Cortázar’s voice, the author speaking the language in which he wrote.
Writing and Running
MFAW faculty Keenan Norris: …my father, was less a reader than a storage chest of historical anecdote and information, come upon by means academic and experiential. He was also a runner, my father, a collegiate national record holder for twenty four hours at one point in time, so while my writings are much less the result of natural talent than dedicated labor, the running is in my blood.