Rewriting With The Surgical Drape Technique
When a character has surgery on TV, you know how the prep nurse always drapes them in sheets first so that only the area being […]
Writing
Chinua Achebe: The Danger of Not Having Your Own Stories
“Then I grew older and began to read about adventures in which I didn’t know that I was supposed to be on the side of […]
Beyond The Only One
At the very end, I read [Shonda Rimes] an audience question that said something like, “How do you think your shows have changed the position […]
The Axe for the Frozen Sea Inside Us 5 comments
We need the books that affect us like disaster, that grieve us deeply, like the death of someone we loved more than ourselves, like being […]
Anne Patchett on Being Open 2 comments
“The answer to the question What now is never what you think it’s going to be, and that is the thing that every writer has […]
Eye Rhymes
Defining Eye Rhymes “Eye Rhymes” are words that look similar but sound different: in other words, the “rhyme” happens for your eyes, not your ears. […]
Louise Erdrich: Advice to Myself 2 comments
My friend the talented Israeli-Brazilian writer Avital Gad-Cykman introduced me to “Advice to Myself” by Louise Erdrich, and I thought it might speak to some […]
Cole Swensen on Getting Unstuck
Cole Swensen shares a great tip for getting unstuck using auto-translation. Whether you speak a second language or not, you can play with machine translators […]
What’s Your Wooden Leg? 3 comments
To wave your wooden leg means to take your problem and put it up there on the screen, full-on, no apologies. We were watching Good […]
