August 10th, 2010%
When you tell someone a story, you decide which details are left in or taken out as you tell it. Who, when, where, and how many times you’ve told the story all impact your focus and clarity.
- Judgment becomes a powerful editor, and asks, “are you focusing on the right details?”
- Confidence becomes an impatient waiter, and asks,”do you even know what you want to say?”
Each version starts to have a different truth, but the same thing happens every time. Short versions. Long versions. The version you told your best friend that can be quickly edited for this particular acquaintance.
Everytime you tell a story, you learn a little more about yourself and a little less about what you thought you knew.
July 15th, 2010%
Upon acceptance to the Tin House Summer Writer’s Workshop, I had to do three things before the workshop started:
- Select a writer with whom I’d like to workshop.
They recommended Charles D’Ambrosio for me. I immediately read everything he wrote. This was a good decision.
- Select a piece to workshop.
Sounds simple. It isn’t. I ended up selecting my best work since I had taken it as far as I could go with my current resources and knowledge. This was a good decision.
- Read/edit pieces from my workshop group.
I decided that I wanted to meet them as people before I read their stuff. As a result, I lack context when they make suggestions to others; I’m missing opportunities to talk to them about their writing; and I’m up late reading/editing their piece versus hanging-out with writers and poets at the workshop. This was not a good decision.
The rules for the actual workshop may vary. Here are our rules:
- The writer doesn’t talk.
- Each workshop participant highlights key writing problems.
- We go clockwise around the room until all participants have spoken.
- All comments must be based on what is written on the page.
- Each participant gives the writer a hard copy of their edits and comments.
July 12th, 2010%
Imagine yourself surrounded by other writers. You have this in common, this one thing.
Now ask yourself, are you a stereotype? What makes you so different, besides everything else?
The Tin House Summer Writer’s Workshop kicked-off yesterday, and I wasn’t sure what to expect. Certainly not silence, but there was nervous silence and post-fight/flight energy drops. My workshop leader is Charles D’Ambrosio, and I think MFA’s are scared of him.
I decided to meet everyone in my group before I read their stories. As we went around doing introductions, I wasn’t sure who had read and who had not, but it became more obvious once we got up to leave for dinner. Everyone had read. Some had researched.
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