My friend Shawn finally send me a link to her website/blog. Go take a look at it.
Shawn is in the same boat as me thesis-wise since she's also working on a creative thesis. She's doing poetry and I'm looking forward to seeing it once she's finished.
When she first told me about her blog, she said she was planning to use it as a way of holding herself accountable to her writing, so I want to urge everybody to stop by her blog and give her a friendly nudge. I know how much you all like to encourage (*cough* nag *cough*) each other. So go say howdy.
Monday, March 10, 2008
When Acronyms Attack: SCWP ISBNs For the SI & WM Anthologies
I don't typically put SCWP stuff up on this blog, but today I just can't help myself.
I'm working through my second and third anthologies for the writing project (one from the summer institute, one from the writing marathon). During the first one, the question of ISBNs came up and we opted to skip it. However, we also decided they would be good for subsequent anthologies.
A couple of days ago I filled out the electronic form. Then they e-mailed us a batch of numbers that are all our own. Neat, huh? We're all official now.
I'm working through my second and third anthologies for the writing project (one from the summer institute, one from the writing marathon). During the first one, the question of ISBNs came up and we opted to skip it. However, we also decided they would be good for subsequent anthologies.
A couple of days ago I filled out the electronic form. Then they e-mailed us a batch of numbers that are all our own. Neat, huh? We're all official now.
Sunday, March 9, 2008
Everybody Knows... Poems
As I've been playing around with poetry lately, I've been thinking back to the exercises David used to assign us in class. There was the animal poem, the famous place name poem, the dream poem... and there was the "Everybody Knows" poem. That last one is what seems to be working best for me right now.
Here's how it works:
The first thing you write is "Everybody knows" and then you put something, anything, after it. This works best if you follow with something that everybody doesn't know. You find some obscure fact, or such and plug it in. Then you keep writing. Once you're done, you delete the "Everybody knows" and you're left with everything that came after it.
Then what's the point of writing it in the first place? It's a mindset thing. When you start a poem with those words, you give yourself the freedom to say anything after without explanation, because everybody knows that what you're saying is true. You don't have to lay it out, you don't have to explain, you just say it, and you can get away with saying anything, thus freeing yourself up for some leaps.
It's a neat trick and if you haven't tried it yet, I highly recommend it.
Here's how it works:
The first thing you write is "Everybody knows" and then you put something, anything, after it. This works best if you follow with something that everybody doesn't know. You find some obscure fact, or such and plug it in. Then you keep writing. Once you're done, you delete the "Everybody knows" and you're left with everything that came after it.
Then what's the point of writing it in the first place? It's a mindset thing. When you start a poem with those words, you give yourself the freedom to say anything after without explanation, because everybody knows that what you're saying is true. You don't have to lay it out, you don't have to explain, you just say it, and you can get away with saying anything, thus freeing yourself up for some leaps.
It's a neat trick and if you haven't tried it yet, I highly recommend it.
Thursday, March 6, 2008
Next Year's H. Eye Cover
Today Andy, Jo, and I went on an expedition to the Arts and Music building to look at possible Hungry Eye cover designs. Since the H. Eye is a university mag., the idea is to do as much in-house as possible. Ergo, the cover gets designed by university art students. Pretty neat, eh?
After our H. Eye meeting (we've got a tentative order laid out and we're beginning to contact authors - hoorah for progress) we hiked across campus and looked at maybe two dozen or more samples that one of the art classes had prepared for us. A lot of good stuff. We narrowed our choices down to two. Jo and Andy are more partial to one, I'm more partial to the other (we'll see how it works out, but I think I have a pretty good argument for choosing the one I like). Then we briefly spoke to the artists of each about some design modifications - i.e. could we see the title in another font? type of stuff.
It was pretty cool, I must say. My favorite cover has an abstract design on the front and it's currently in red, gray, and black. The artist is going to modify the colors to go with a more earthy palette, and we'll have another look. If it were just me, I'd take it right now as is, but it's not just my call, so we'll see.
On a side note: the artist who created my favorite cover is also a football player. How do you like that juxtaposition?
After our H. Eye meeting (we've got a tentative order laid out and we're beginning to contact authors - hoorah for progress) we hiked across campus and looked at maybe two dozen or more samples that one of the art classes had prepared for us. A lot of good stuff. We narrowed our choices down to two. Jo and Andy are more partial to one, I'm more partial to the other (we'll see how it works out, but I think I have a pretty good argument for choosing the one I like). Then we briefly spoke to the artists of each about some design modifications - i.e. could we see the title in another font? type of stuff.
It was pretty cool, I must say. My favorite cover has an abstract design on the front and it's currently in red, gray, and black. The artist is going to modify the colors to go with a more earthy palette, and we'll have another look. If it were just me, I'd take it right now as is, but it's not just my call, so we'll see.
On a side note: the artist who created my favorite cover is also a football player. How do you like that juxtaposition?
Tuesday, March 4, 2008
Scottish Lit. Blog
Since I've mentioned the blog, I thought you all might want to take a look. You can find all things Eng. 630 here.
Monday, March 3, 2008
Commitments
Last week was rough. Between all of my various commitments, almost all of my free time got gobbled up and I just couldn't manage writing time. I was really aware of this, too, in a way I'm not really aware of missing a project goal. The Tree Story never got revised, but I didn't really think about missing that goal. Missing my Thursday pages has been much more prominent in my mind.
Right now it's working better for me to commit to writing time rather than committing to finishing specific projects. If I figure on writing for an hour, then I'm automatically making progress and I have that designated time. Whereas if I figure on finishing a project, I'm more likely not to hit that goal because of procrastination. If I can do it tomorrow, then I'm not working on it today. However, if I'm working on it today, I might just finish it today.
As a bonus, since I'm "just" committing to the time, I have less pressure on myself because I don't have to make any particular amount of progress - even though having a time commitment usually means I end up with more pages than I would otherwise. It's really just a matter of coming at it from the other side.
When you make writing commitments, is it usually more effective for you to make those commitments in terms of time spent writing, page counts, or finishing a specific story/poem/chapter/etc.?
Right now it's working better for me to commit to writing time rather than committing to finishing specific projects. If I figure on writing for an hour, then I'm automatically making progress and I have that designated time. Whereas if I figure on finishing a project, I'm more likely not to hit that goal because of procrastination. If I can do it tomorrow, then I'm not working on it today. However, if I'm working on it today, I might just finish it today.
As a bonus, since I'm "just" committing to the time, I have less pressure on myself because I don't have to make any particular amount of progress - even though having a time commitment usually means I end up with more pages than I would otherwise. It's really just a matter of coming at it from the other side.
When you make writing commitments, is it usually more effective for you to make those commitments in terms of time spent writing, page counts, or finishing a specific story/poem/chapter/etc.?
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