I made a reference to “Choose Your Own Adventure” books in one of my classes last week and, because I had to explain the concept, because nobody knew about choosing your own adventure, I started to think about how entertainment has changed. It really turns into a pre-computer or pre-Internet thing…
Before computers and/or Internet: Read [...]
I have to admit, I get excited walking around campus and watching freshman orientation groups tripping over (or colliding into) each other. Not just because I like calamity, either. There’s a lot of positive energy buzzing around a college campus before classes start and it’s hard not to get caught up in the excitement.
To keep [...]
I’m scheduled to teach a beginning fiction workshop this summer but at the moment there’s a slight technical difficulty: nobody has registered for the class. Workshops are very popular in the regular fall/spring semesters. Summer sessions? Nobody knows. Nobody’s tried it here before, and apparently the summer school crowd is a shifty bunch.
But I won’t [...]
After a post-graduation week of Nashville vacation-type activities, it’s time to get back to work. Or at least something resembling work. I’m still making my way through story revisions and sending stories out into the void. Also reading submissions for Nashville Review (if you have a story to send, send it).
In other week-beginning news, I [...]
(Continuation from Monday’s post.)
Recently I’ve been reading parts of John Gardner’s book “On Becoming a Novelist,” and I swear I found this part just as I was reaching the same conclusion:
I had by this time already faced the painful truth every committed young writer must eventually face, that he’s on his own. Teachers and editors [...]
(I broke this into two posts, one today, and one for Wednesday.)
I’m enjoying a two-week lull between the end of classes and graduation. That’s how I’m pitching it to myself: a two-week period in which I can ignore the obvious questions like “What’s next?” or “What about health insurance?”
First, health insurance? I’m more worried [...]
