Reasons for writing

Confession: I occasionally goof off at work. But at least I have the grace to feel guilty about it.

Reading:

• "L. DeBard and Aliette: A Love Story," by Lauren Groff
  
• The House of Mirth, by Edith Wharton
  

Writing:

• "Ferian Fetlock Hitches a Ride" - 1,455 words (Estimated completion 14%)
• "Ferian Fetlock Catches a Cold" - Outline 100%
  

Revising:

• "The Revenant"
• "Cora and the Sea" - Third draft 50%

Still no word from the Tea lady. I think she wants to find out what happens when my countdown below ends tomorrow.

By the way, did you see that the word count on Ferian went backwards again? Yeah, that was on purpose. I did a rewrite of the first section again, cut out a couple of extraneous paragraphs and tightened elsewhere. I'm much more content with where it stands, and you might even see some more movement soon.

I've been given the potential opportunity to run a workshop at some point in the future. That's right, I didn't say attend, I said run. (Who thought it was a good idea to give me power? Geez.)

Me being me, I immediately started brainstorming workshop ideas. Of course, anyone who has ever taught knows that you have to tailor yourself to the group you're working with. So I've identified the three major groups I've seen in workshops: the poets, the memoir writers, and the fiction writers.

Sure, there are other writing interests out there, but they don't seem to come to workshops. I've met one biographer, and he was writing it more as a fictionalize version, so I'm going to toss him in the last group. I'm in the last group too, by the way; I'm not nearly interesting enough to be worth a memoir yet.

Poets, I think, benefit a lot from the theory of writing, in regards to metaphors, alliteration, prosody, verse structure, rhythm, assonance, and all the stuff you learned in 8th grade English and forgot by 9th. Here's an idea... for a poet-heavy group, do a Poet of the Month and read some already published poetry.

Memoir writers tend to be older, although this is not universally true. They're less concerned about the mechanics of writing, and more concerned with sharing it with people. They might benefit most from discussions of story structure, and how to recast their memories into narrative form. I think James Herriot would be a great author for them to read.

Finally, the fiction writers often need the mechanics of point of view, grammar, and sentence structure. The narrative form and story structure is important too, as is the metaphor and rhythm parts mentioned in poetry.

In other words, fiction kind of forms the middle ground between memoir and poetry. (Or at least it does according to this way of thinking. I may be biased.) But if I target my general discussion towards these issues, I can probably find a way to make it interesting for everybody.

Publication Status:

• Submitted: 5
  
• Accepted: 1.05?
• Rejected: 2
• Pending: 1.95?