'Capitalize on your treasure house of self-knowledge'

 

“One thing that makes art different from life is that in art things have a shape... it allows us to fix our emotions on events at the moment they occur, it permits a union of heart and mind and tongue and tear.” – Marilyn French

Born in Brooklyn on Nov. 21, 1929 French started writing as a journalist while still in college.   She interrupted that career path to start her family before earning Master’s and Doctorate degrees in English and returning to writing as an essayist and sometime short story writer.  

  

Her first and best-known novel, The Women's Room, hit the market in 1977 and was a huge bestseller.   The story follows the details and lives of several women in 1950s and 1960s America during the dawning and subsequent impact of militant radical feminism.  To date it has sold over 20 million copies  and been translated into more than 20 languages.     

                                       

French's advice to beginning writers is simple.   "Capitalize on things that might seem to get in your way   What are you afraid of and why?  Our fears are a treasure house of self-knowledge if only we explore them.”