'Every Page A Gem'

“I like the idea that every page in every book can have a gem on it. It's probably what I love most about writing - that words can be used in a way that's like a child playing in a sandpit, rearranging things, swapping them around.” –  Markus Zusak

The Book Thief, Zusak's heart-wrenching novel about the awful years in Germany during the late 1930s and through World War II, was written when he was still in 20s.  Published in 2005, the novel followed on the heels of two other award-winning novels I Am the Messenger and When Dogs Cry.   Born in Australia on this date in 1975, Zusak has written half-a-dozen best sellers.  The Book Thief alone was on the New York Times bestseller list for a remarkable 375 weeks.  

 

 His writing career is a testament to perserverance and “knowing that a story is    

worth fighting to get published.”  He wrote When Dogs Cry as a teenager and it took him 7 years to get it accepted.  Since then it’s not only sold continuously but also won many awards around the globe, as has Zusak, who was named for the annual Margaret Edwards Award in 2014 for his contribution to young-adult literature.    “I try hard and aim big,” Zusak said.   “People can hate or love my books but they can never accuse me of not trying.”

“Failure has been my best friend as a writer,” he said after finally getting When Dogs Cry published.  “It tests you, to see if you have what it takes to see it through.” 

 

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A Writer's Moment: Flipping On The Writing Switch

A Writer's Moment: Flipping On The Writing Switch:   “Writing's funny, it's like walking down a hall in the dark looking for the light switch, and suddenly you find it, flip it on, an...

Flipping On The Writing Switch

 “Writing's funny, it's like walking down a hall in the dark looking for the light switch, and suddenly you find it, flip it on, and then you discover the hallway you passed through is papered with the novel you've written.” – Jonathan Safran Foer

Words are capable of making experience more vivid, and also of organizing it. They can scare us, and they can comfort us, Foer says.  Currently a professor in the Writing Program at NYU, Foer was just breaking onto the market when he wrote his critically acclaimed novel Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close about a young boy dealing with the death of his father on 9/11.

The book was subsequently made into a movie, nominated for Academy Awards in both the Best Picture and Best Supporting Actor categories. While it starred Tom Hanks, Sandra Bullock and Max von Sydow ( the Best Supporting Actor nominee), it was Tom Horn as the 9-year-old protagonist who received most of the acclaim for his heart-wrenching interpretation of the words that Foer had written.

 

Foer, born in 1977, also is acclaimed for his non-fiction works, especially 2019’s We Are the Weather: Saving the Planet Begins at Breakfast.

He says he likes to approach writing like a sculptor.  “There are two kinds of sculptures,” he said. “There's the kind that subtracts: Michelangelo starts with a block of marble and chips away. And then there is the kind that adds, building with clay, piling it on. The way I write novels is to keep piling on and piling on and piling on."

 

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A Writer's Moment: 'The Hero of Your Own Story'

A Writer's Moment: 'The Hero of Your Own Story': “We all live in suspense from day to day; in other words, you are the hero of your own story.” –   Mary McCarthy ...

'The Hero of Your Own Story'

“We all live in suspense from day to day; in other words, you are the hero of your own story.” –  Mary McCarthy

Author, critic and political activist, McCarthy was born in Seattle on this date in 1912  and built her reputation as a satirist, primarily with her novel The Group, which remained on the New York Times Best Seller list for almost two years.

Noted for her precise prose and its complex mixture of autobiography and fiction, she also was considered “scandalous” in her younger years, especially with her first novel The Company She Keeps, which “told it like it was” in 1930s New York Society.

Winner of two Guggenheim Fellowships and a number of other major “funding” awards, she was named for the National Medal for Literature and

 the Edward MacDowell Medal, both in 1984   

 on the cusp of learning that she had lung cancer.  During her later years, in recognition of her groundbreaking work, she was presented with 8 honorary degrees from some of America’s leading universities.

Despite being a respected critic, she often feuded with other writers over her frank and often not-so-flattering reactions to their works.  As for her own writing, she said she surprised herself with their outcomes. “The suspense of a novel,” I think, “is not only for the reader, but in the novelist, who is usually intensely curious about what will happen to her hero.”

 

 

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A Writer's Moment: 'Poetry and Music . . . Good Friends'

A Writer's Moment: 'Poetry and Music . . . Good Friends': “Poetry and music are very good friends. Like mommies and daddies and strawberries and cream - they ...

'Poetry and Music . . . Good Friends'

“Poetry and music are very good friends. Like mommies and daddies and strawberries and cream - they go together.” –  Nikki Giovanni

Born in June of 1943, Giovanni is a renowned poet and essayist who has taught at Queens College, Rutgers, and Ohio State and is currently a University Distinguished Professor at Virginia Tech.   Her poetry has ranged from the somber, such as the chant-poem she delivered at the memorial for the Virginia Tech shooting victims, to thoughtful and whimsical, such as today’s short poem. 

 

 For Saturday’s Poem, here is Giovanni’s: 

 

                        

I wrote a good omelet

 

                                          I wrote a good omelet...and ate

a hot poem... after loving you
Buttoned my car...and drove my
coat home...in the rain...
after loving you
I goed on red...and stopped on
green...floating somewhere in between...
being here and being there...
after loving you
I rolled my bed...turned down
my hair...slightly
confused but...I don't care...
Laid out my teeth...and gargled my
gown...then I stood
...and laid me down...
To sleep...
after loving you.

 

 

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