I’ve been fortunate enough to have a handful of things published. Some journalism, essays, poetry, and fiction. Even got some paychecks. But, I admit, sending stuff out is hard. As an unknown author, you are a pebble on the beach—so very many people want to be writers. Editors are getting mountains of submissions. The odds [...]
Archive for the ‘On Writing’ Category
Submitting
Posted in On Writing, Personal on May 16, 2011 | Leave a Comment »
How writers ought to spend time
Posted in On Writing on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“The greatest part of a writer’s time is spent in reading, in order to write; a man will turn over half a library to make one book.” –Samuel Johnson Whether it’s literary short stories from one of The O. Henry Prize Stories collections or Cormac McCarthy’s dark but “consistently brilliant” (NY Times) book The Road, [...]
Idols of words
Posted in On Writing on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Men are idolaters and want something to look at and kiss and hug, or throw themselves down before; they always did, they always will; and if you don’t make it out of wood, you must make it out of words.” –Oliver Wendell Holmes Interesting statement. Is it the writer’s job to mold words into ideas [...]
Author as God
Posted in On Writing on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“The author should be in his work like God is in the universe–present everywhere and visible nowhere.” –Gustave Flaubert An intriguing view. One ignored, I suspect, by the authors of many fine works. Art is a personal platform. It can be preached from. Is that always bad? –Jim
Killing Darlings
Posted in On Writing on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Sit down and put down everything that comes into your head and then you’re a writer. But an author is one who can judge his own stuff’s worth, without pity, and destroy most of it.” –Colette Very hard to do but critical. Writers often suffer from one of two extreme views: 1. Everything I write [...]
Chekhov — On Less
Posted in On Writing on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Another piece of advice: when you proofread cross out as many adjectives and adverbs as you can. You have so many modifiers that the reader has trouble understanding and gets worn out. It is comprehensible when I write: ‘The man sat on the grass,’ because it is clear and does not detain one’s attention. On [...]
Writing = Stepping on a Landmine
Posted in On Writing on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Every morning I jump out of bed and step on a landmine. The landmine is me. After the explosion, I spend the rest of the day putting the pieces together.” –Ray Bradbury
What a writer is and is not
Posted in On Writing on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Let me tell you what a writer is. A writer takes comprehensive views, holds large convictions, makes wide generalizations. A writer’s not English, Mexican, or American. A writer’s not a woman nor a man. A writer’s not Christian, Jew, Buddhist, Muslim, nor snake worshipper. To local standards of right and wrong a writer’s civilly indifferent. [...]
Carl Sandburg on Poetry
Posted in On Writing on April 14, 2009 | Leave a Comment »
“Poetry is the establishment of a metaphorical link between white butterfly wings and the scraps of torn up love letters.”
Poetry is a weird thing
Posted in On Writing, Poetry on September 4, 2008 | Leave a Comment »
“…the poet…the lonely one who looks on, The bearer of human longing, the pale image Of whom the future, the fulfillment of the world Has no further need. Many garlands Wilt on his grave, But no one remembers him.” Hermann Hesse There’s a happy thought, Mr. Hesse. Thanks for that. I’ve been tinkering again [...]
