A Writer's Moment: 'Words are our life'

A Writer's Moment: 'Words are our life':   “Words are our life. We are human because we use language. So I think we are less human when we use less language.” – Carol Shields   ...

'Words are our life'

 

“Words are our life. We are human because we use language. So I think we are less human when we use less language.” – Carol Shields

 

Born in Oak Park, IL on June 2, 1935 Shields grew up in America but spent much of her adult life in Canada.  She was a full-time writing professor, novelist, playwright and short story writer and won both the Pulitzer Prize and Canada’s equivalent, The Governor General’s Award, for her novel The Stone Diaries – the only writer to ever win both awards for the same book.   She died from cancer in 2003.

 

Shields’ short story collections, including Various Miracles and Dressing Up for the Carnival, also were much-honored and are part of the Collected Stories of Carol Shields published after her death.   Her nonfiction book on author Jane Austin also won several major awards.   And her plays, particularly "Departures and Arrivals" and "Thirteen Hands" have been performed countless times by amateur and professional theater companies around the globe.

 

Shields was an advocate of using life experiences in writing, but only selectively.  “There are chapters in every life which are seldom read,” she explained, “and certainly not aloud.”

A Writer's Moment: 'It's what nourishes the imagination'

A Writer's Moment: 'It's what nourishes the imagination':   “You expect far too much of a first sentence. Think of it as analogous to a good country breakfast: what we want is something simple, but ...

'It's what nourishes the imagination'

 

“You expect far too much of a first sentence. Think of it as analogous to a good country breakfast: what we want is something simple, but nourishing to the imagination.” –  Larry McMurtry

 

Born in Wichita Falls, TX on June 3, 1936 McMurtry was considered the consummate writer of “the perfect first sentence,” and readers rewarded him for it with multiple bestselling novels.  Viewers were equally appreciative, flocking to movie adaptations of many of his works. 

 

Among his dozens of bestsellers are such classics as The Last Picture Show, Terms of Endearment, and Lonesome Dove.  His movies earned a remarkable 26 Academy Award nominations with 10 wins, and the Lonesome Dove television series, earned 18 Emmy nominations with seven wins, plus a Pulitzer Prize for Literature.  And he co-wrote (with Diana Ossana) the Academy Award-winning screenplay for Brokeback Mountain.

 

A rancher’s son, McMurtry got his first taste of storytelling as a boy sitting on his parents’ porch listening to stories from them and their ranch hands.   After studying creative writing at North Texas State, he did graduate work at Rice and Stanford, where he also became a rare-book scout.  Ultimately, in addition to his writing, he became one of America’s most prominent antiquarian booksellers, amassing nearly half-a-million books.  The Larry McMurtry Literary Center, established in Archer City, TX after his death in 2021, maintains an estimated 300,000 volumes from his collection. 

 

“A bookman’s love of books,” McMurtry said, “is a love of books, not merely of the information in them.”

A Writer's Moment: 'Food for thought - and writing'

A Writer's Moment: 'Food for thought - and writing':   “Most memoir writers will tell you that the hardest part of writing a memoir isn't what to include, but what to leave out.”  – Kathlee...

'Food for thought - and writing'

 

“Most memoir writers will tell you that the hardest part of writing a memoir isn't what to include, but what to leave out.” – Kathleen Flinn

Born in Davison, Michigan on this date in 1967, Flinn is a memoirist, journalist and chef, best known for her New York Times bestseller The Sharper Your Knife, the Less You Cry.   After earning a degree in journalism from Columbia College in Chicago, she wrote for newspapers and magazines in a number of states and nationally, including working as an obituary writer in Sarasota, Fla.  That experience was – in a way – her first chance to write “memoirs.”  

 

It was also at that time that she started thinking about attending culinary school at the world-famous Le Cordon Bleu and her book is the first to provide an in-depth look at attending and graduating from the famed school.  To date, it has been translated into nine languages, sold in more than 60 countries and is in production for a television series.

Flinn’s most recent book is Burnt Toast Makes You Sing Good, a multi-generational culinary memoir about growing up in Michigan.  A finalist for several book awards, it also has earned a citation from the  International Association of Culinary Professionals.  And her writing success all goes back to her time writing obits in Sarasota.

 

 “I didn’t realize it at the time," she said, "but writing obituaries was one of best jobs that I've ever had. After all, it's the only time that someone will ever laminate my work and put it in their Bible. Plus, let's be honest, writing obits in Sarasota is a very busy job. The saying was that old people lived in Miami, but their parents lived in Sarasota.”

A Writer's Moment: 'Specialize in the impossible'

A Writer's Moment: 'Specialize in the impossible':   “What we need is more people who specialize in the impossible.” – Theodore Roethke Born in Saginaw, Michigan on May 25, 1908 Roethke ha...