A Writer's Moment: Be A Reader - Every Day

A Writer's Moment: Be A Reader - Every Day: “Read something of interest every day - something of interest to you, not to your teacher or your best friend or your ...

Be A Reader - Every Day

“Read something of interest every day - something of interest to you, not to your teacher or your best friend or your minister/rabbi/priest. Comics count. So does poetry. So do editorials in your school newspaper. Or a biography of a rock star. Or an instructional manual. Or the Bible.” – Jane Yolen

Born in New York City on this date in 1939, Yolen was immersed in writing almost from birth, the daughter of a journalist and public relations writer.  She started writing in elementary school and created a “newspaper” in her Manhattan apartment building while still in junior high, a time when she also wrote multi-page essay about New York State’s manufacturing industry – in rhyme.

In high school, she won a Scholastic magazine poetry contest, and edited and wrote for the school newspaper, something she continued at Smith College.  There, she also wrote a book of poetry, was president of the Press Board, and penned song lyrics for theater productions in which she was involved.   On her 21^st birthday, she sold her first book (nonfiction) about female pirates titled Pirates in Petticoats.  “After that,“ she said, “I was a book writer for good.”

The author or editor of nearly 400 books and short stories, her best known tales are The Devil's Arithmetic, a Holocaust novella; the Nebula Award-winning short story Sister Emily's Lightship; a novelette Lost Girls; and her children’s books Owl Moon, The Emperor and the Kite, and the Commander Toad series. 

                       Yolen said a writing technique she has always employed is to read everything aloud, no matter whether it’s a novel, an essay, or a children’s picture book.  “I believe the eye and ear are different ‘listeners’,” she explained.  “So as writers, we have to please both.”

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A Writer's Moment: The talent of a writer

A Writer's Moment: The talent of a writer: “Every human being has hundreds of separate people living under his skin. The talent of a writer is his ability to give them their separate...

The talent of a writer

“Every human being has hundreds of separate people living under his skin. The talent of a writer is his ability to give them their separate names, identities, personalities and have them relate to other characters living with him." - Mel Brooks  

Born Melvin Kaminsky in Brooklyn, NY, in 1926, Brooks started his long, successful show business career by organizing entertainment for combat troops who had advanced across Europe in the last part of WWII.  That was when he wasn't defusing landmines and destroying pillboxes as part of a special combat engineering unit - service that won awards for heroism.

While many only think of Mel Brooks as a comedian, the multi-talented 92-year-old also is a thoughtful writer who is one of only a handful of people to have won all four of the major entertainment awards - Oscar, Emmy, Grammy and Tony - three of them for writing.

A poet, too, he wrote: 

Hope for the best.

Expect the worst. 

Life is a play. 

We’re unrehearsed.

  

A Writer's Moment: Genre-hopping writing success

A Writer's Moment: Genre-hopping writing success: “Often, when you look at history, at least through the lens that many of us have looked at history - high school and c...

A Writer's Moment: 'Wising Up'

A Writer's Moment: 'Wising Up': “We get wise by asking questions, and even if these are not answered, we get wise, for a well-packed question carries its answer on its ba...

'Wising Up'

“We get wise by asking questions, and even if these are not answered, we get wise, for a well-packed question carries its answer on its back as a snail carries its shell.” – James Stephens 

       Irish novelist and poet Stephens, born on this date in 1882, produced many retellings of Irish myths and fairy tales, often marked by a rare combination of humor and lyricism.  His Irish Fairy Tales is especially praised, as his novel  The Crock of Gold.  “Quietness,” Stephens once said, “is the beginning of virtue. To be silent is to be beautiful. Stars do not make a noise.”   For Saturday’s Poem, here is Stephens’,

        In The Poppy Field

Mad Patsy said, he said to me,
That every morning he could see
An angel walking on the sky;
Across the sunny skies of morn
He threw great handfuls far and nigh
Of poppy seed among the corn;
And then, he said, the angels run
To see the poppies in the sun.

A poppy is a devil weed,
I said to him - he disagreed;
He said the devil had no hand
In spreading flowers tall and fair
Through corn and rye and meadow land,
by garth and barrow everywhere:
The devil has not any flower,
But only money in his power.

And then he stretched out in the sun
And rolled upon his back for fun:
He kicked his legs and roared for joy
Because the sun was shining down:
He said he was a little boy
And would not work for any clown:
He ran and laughed behind a bee,
And danced for very ecstasy.

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