A Writer's Moment
A look at writing and writers who inspire us.
Popular Posts
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A Writer's Moment: 'Writing, Publishing - two separate things' : “I always tell students that writing a poem and publishing i...
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A Writer's Moment: 'Property of the imagination' : “The English language is nobody's special property. ...
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A Writer's Moment: 'Be willing to fail' : “I'm always terrified when I'm writing.” – Mary Karr ...
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“Librarians and romance writers accomplish one mission better than anyone, including English teachers: we create readers for life - and w...
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“I'm always terrified when I'm writing.” – Mary Karr Karr’s sentiment probably echoes all who take pen in ...
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A Writer's Moment: 'Companions in One's Life' : “Man was very fortunate to have invented the book. Without it, the past w...
Thursday, March 28, 2024
A Writer's Moment: 'Powerful language, powerful feelings and images'
'Powerful language, powerful feelings and images'
“The kinds of things that poetry can offer are timeless - mainly the kind of compression it offers of powerful language, powerful feelings and images, and, you know, the inner experience becoming outer.” – Brenda Hillman
Born in Tucson, AZ in March of 1951, Hillman is the author of numerous poetry collections, including Seasonal Works with Letters on Fire, named for the Griffin Poetry Prize and the Northern California Book Award for Poetry. Her newest book, just out this year, is In a Few Minutes Before Later.
A “writer” of poetry since age 9 (“the first time I wrote a poem that I was proud of,”) Hillman is known for poems that draw on elements of found texts and documents, personal meditation, and observation including about topics like geology, the environment, politics, family, and spirituality.
Among her many awards are The Pushcart Prize and Fellowships from the Academy of American Poets, the National Endowment for the Arts and the Guggenheim Foundation. A longtime writing professor, she holds the Olivia Filippi Chair in Poetry at Saint Mary’s College of California.
“The techniques of contemporary poetry are probably the techniques of your daily life,” Hillman said. “I don't know a single person who goes into the grocery store and thinks in complete sentences.”
Wednesday, March 27, 2024
A Writer's Moment: 'Genuine magic in what they do'
'Genuine magic in what they do'
“I
love artists. I find them fascinating. To me, there really is a genuine magic
in what they do.” – Elizabeth Hand
Hand, who was born in Yonkers, New York in March of 1957, studied drama and anthropology in college and thought of a career on stage before getting into writing. Since 1988, she has lived in coastal Maine, the setting for many of her stories, and she also lives part-time in Camden Town, London, the setting for her historical fantasy novel Mortal Love and short story "Cleopatra Brimstone.”
While Science Fiction and Fantasy have been focal points for many of her works, she said she didn’t read much Science Fiction as a kid. “I was a total Tolkien geek - but I started reading Samuel Delany and Angela Carter and Ursula LeGuin in high school, and I was definitely taken with the notion that here was a literature that could explore various notions of gender identity and how it affects the culture at large.”
Also a writer of television and sci-fi movie spin-offs, Hand is co-author of the DC Comics’ cult favorite Anima. Her most recent book is 2023’s A Haunting on the Hill. And she is a longtime reviewer and critic for The Washington Post, Los Angeles Times and Village Voice, among others, and writes a regular review column for The Magazine of Fantasy and Science Fiction.
“I never think about genré when I work,” she
said. “I've written fantasy, science
fiction, supernatural fiction . . . suspense.
Genrés are mostly useful as a marketing tool, and to help booksellers
know where to shelve a book.”
Tuesday, March 26, 2024
A Writer's Moment: 'Breaking the wall in a zig-zag pattern'
'Breaking the wall in a zig-zag pattern'