by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 23, 2009 | reading |
As many of you know, I’m reading Infinite Jest. As many of you also know, I did not enjoy my first experience with the Kindle. Last week, the night before I was to leave for a 3-day trip, I stood by my desk, looking from Infinite Jest to Kindle. If I was ever...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 21, 2009 | catching moments, continuous life, poetry |
One of my all-time-favorite poems is “The Continuous Life” by Mark Strand from his book of poems, The Continuous Life. Here’s the beginning: What of the neighborhood homes awash In a silver light, of children hunched in the bushes, Watching the...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 17, 2009 | accumulation, craft of writing, stories |
Yesterday a flash fiction story of mine, Watching, was published in an online magazine called Six Sentences. Trying to tell a story in six sentences is enlightening because the writing process is compressed, making it easy to see what you’re doing and why. My...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 15, 2009 | craft of writing, details, reviews |
When Mari Strachan was a little girl, she used to create pretend newspapers, carefully writing the stories in pencil, drawing a picture to go with them, and then sewing the pages together. She says, “I’ve always loved the physicality of books and paper and...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 13, 2009 | craft of writing, details, memoir, memory, reviews, shapes |
I don’t write memoir. But I like the way Abigail Thomas writes, the way she tells the truth. “My truth doesn’t travel in a straight line, it zigzags, detours, doubles back. Most truths I have to learn over and over again.” I got hooked on the...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 10, 2009 | place |
So the logical, orderly side of me is distressed that I haven’t better organized this trilogy of posts–my writing room, the writer’s desk, and today, a room with a view. Instead it’s the writer’s side of me that has let one thing lead to...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 8, 2009 | accumulation, place |
In a comment to yesterday’s post, a reader reminded me of Jill Krementz’ photographs in The Writer’s Desk, which was published in 1996, the same year as Infinite Jest, and is now out of print. I had forgotten all about this book. I pulled it off the...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 7, 2009 | accumulation, place |
The Guardian has for some time been doing a series on writers’ rooms. The most recent piece featured Michael Morpurgo: “For many years, I wrote on our bed in the house. But there were complaints about ink on the sheets, dirty feet on the bed…”...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 3, 2009 | reading |
David Foster Wallace’s 1079 page Infinite Jest has been in residence in my study for 13 years–since 1996. When I first heard about Infinite Summer, I glanced over at the large book on the bottom of my ToBeRead shelf, and I thought nooooo. Then, after...
by Cynthia Newberry Martin | Jul 1, 2009 | craft of writing, essays, reviews |
The Writer’s Notebook, with its title taken from the journals of Somerset Maugham, consists of 17 essays on the craft of writing. Some, but not all, are based on craft seminars given at the Tin House Summer Writers Workshop. I did not read them in order, but...
