From the category archives:

Writing

Gender Bias

August 25, 2010

Recently, I was reminded of the scene from the film As Good As It Gets where the novelist Melvin Udall (Jack Nicholson’s character) is talking to a receptionist. She asks Udall, “How do you write women so well?” and he replies, “I think of a man, and I take away reason and accountability.” Is there [...]

Read the full article →

The New Archetypes: Part 3

August 16, 2010

Image by Neil Crosby via Flickr Last time I talked about the Nobody.  Everybody has felt like a Nobody at some point which makes the Nobody a sort of everyman.  If you can’t root for him at least you can identify with him.  Before that was the Rogue Cop.  This guy (it’s almost always a [...]

Read the full article →

“Our doubts are traitors…” Measure for Measure (I.iv.77)

August 11, 2010

Image via Wikipedia In his collection of journals entitled Confessions of a Barbarian, the twenty-five-year-old Edward Abbey ponders the progress he is making on his first novel: “The novel, my terrible novel, will drive me to ruin…A frightful labor! “And the worth of it, the quality—the problem worries me night and day. At times I’m [...]

Read the full article →

The Truth About Workshops

August 9, 2010

Taking a manuscript into a critique workshop is an expedient and sometimes necessary step to understand how readers view and respond to any given piece you’ve written. At their best, a workshop is a coming together of equally skilled and similarly committed writers under the guidance of a master of the trade, both as writer [...]

Read the full article →

The New Archetypes: Part 2

August 2, 2010

Image by HaPe_Gera via Flickr Last time I nominated the Rogue Cop for a truly modern archetype.  Dirty Harry of course being the template but we can all get behind a Martin Riggs, your choice of Tango or Cash, or even Lt. Marion ‘Cobra’ Cobretti (even if you don’t want to admit you loved Cobra).  The [...]

Read the full article →

← Previous Entries

Next Entries →