A Circle of Writing Mentors and Students and More

I love a circle. 

During my time in the Stonecoast MFA program, I was lucky to meet Meredith Hall, whose essays I had read in Creative Nonfiction. She gave a rousing guest lecture that stirred up strong feelings for many of us, about thinking bigger, about being generous with our stories, and bringing everything to the page, not holding back.  

Mostly what I remember is this advice:  Be audacious in what you go after -- and go after a lot. Age doesn't matter! Apply for grants! Seek residencies! Enter contests! Be bold! Why not you?

I went home, bought her memoir, Without A Map, read it in one afternoon. We exchanged friendly emails. I reread her book again slowly, and realized she'd grown up in the same New Hampshire town as my husband's cousin. A few quick emails confirmed that they were once good friends, and Meredith also remembered my sister-in-law, a frequent New Hampshire visitor during their childhoods. I was able to put them all back in touch, and that felt wonderful. 

It would be enough if the circle ended there.  But there's more.

After hearing Meredith at Stonecoast, I began submitting my work more often, and entered my first contest with an essay about visiting my father in the hospital in Las Vegas. It placed second in the Charles Simic Graduate Student Writing Contest, and with the honor came a bit of cash and publication in Barnstorm, the journal edited by the MFA program at University of New Hampshire.

Though energies and enthusiasm sometimes flag, I've kept entering, submitting, applying, and often while doing so, I think of Meredith. I interviewed her for my research thesis, and for an anthology of craft and publishing advice. 

The circle widens.

After I began teaching and coaching writers, I got an email from someone I would get to know as a lovely writer and delightful person. I remember Alyssa Martino's first email because at the moment it arrived, I was waiting for another flight in the Las Vegas airport, where I'd been visiting my ill mother. I was glad for a distraction from my sadness.

Alyssa signed up for an online classes, then to continue working on essays and memoir pieces, and finally to shape and polish her portfolio to accompany applications to MFA programs.

Where does she land but at University of New Hampshire, and in whose class does she find herself? Meredith Hall's. I've had such fun hearing from Alyssa periodically, about how much she's learned from Meredith, and the deep satisfaction she's experiencing developing her writing craft. Tell Meredith hello! I've often written back. Meredith says hi! she's replied.

When I send a newsletter about something I've accomplished, a reply invariably arrives from Meredith:  thinking of you...congratulations...delighted and not surprised...such lovely news. When I look back at craft notes taken during the MFA, she's there too.

Now, Alyssa is working toward graduation, building her own teaching skills, and working on the editorial staff of...Barnstorm. One of her responsibilities is to interview writers for a section called The Writer's Hot Seat. A few months ago, she asked to interview me. 

I'm so pleased the interview is now up at Barnstorm.

I'm tempted to say the circle now feels complete.  

But I know better.

Gold in Them Notebooks: Part 14, and -- That's a Wrap.

While reorganizing my office a few months ago, I took a break to flip through the notebooks I filled during my MFA program. Rereading the notes I'd taken at faculty lectures, workshops, panels, visiting writer seminars, and graduating student presentation, I didn't want to stop. There was so much wisdom gleaned from so many talented individuals. I decided to leave the notebooks in a prominent place on my newly-neatened bookshelves, and every week or so, randomly select something to share here on the blog. As the year winds down, I'm concluding the Gold in Them Notebooks series with these random bits of advice I gathered:


• Beware the happy ending.
• When you tell your readers, you are the only one involved in the quest. When you show them, they can participate in the quest along with you. Guess which they'd rather do?
• Memory is the mother of all muses.
• Write about what you cannot shut up about.
• When you write a story, you create a world, whether you plan to or not. So why not do it with intention?
• A sense of humor is a universal need for readers.
• At the pre-writing stage, two thoughts are usually sure signs you are on to a good thing:
1. I'd better write about that because it won't leave me alone. Or, even better: 2. Oh, I could never/should never write about that.
• When looking for prospective agents, always check the author's acknowledgements page in books that you like or that have a similar vibe to your manuscript. Authors almost always thank their agents by name.
• When writing a scene, think about the strip tease. One reveals gradually.


You can read the other 13 parts of the series here.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 13. Nothing unlucky here.

In this series, I'm passing on good writing advice which I recorded in notebooks while I was an MFA student.

From a nonfiction workshop:

Narrative is a compendium of modules, not necessarily just a beginning, middle, and end. It's an assembly of parts – scenes, reflection, expository, dialogue; not a chronology. You assemble them as building blocks. When considering your next revision, look for what's not on the page, where are the holes for missing blocks? And figure out, what is my comfortable length for a block – how many words or pages?

- Baron Wormser, former poet laureate of Maine, author of seven books of poetry, a memoir, and a short story collection. Baron also noted that his memoir, The Road Washes Out in Spring, was an assemblage of some 80-plus such parts.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 12: Scriptwriting Tips for Prose Writers

One of the most spirited visiting writer seminars during my MFA was titled Scriptwriting Techniques, with a subtitle something along the lines of: what prose writers can learn from writing for visual media.

Some of the take-away were these questions to ask, particularly at the revision stage and/or when something seems fundamentally wrong about a piece, but the writer can't put a finger on just what it is:

- Did I avoid the climactic moment? Did I avoid all the chaos it would wreak so that I would not have to try to write my way out from there?
- Have I let my characters do unforgivable, wild, unpredictable things?
- Have I plucked out an ugly duckling (a segment of the piece that may at first seem off) instead of leaving it there and seeing what happens? Seeing if it
turns into a swan?
- Have I shown that all of my characters are flawed in some way? (They should be.)
- Is it very clear what the main character wants?

-Jamie Cat Callan, author of The Writer's Toolbox, and French Women Don't Sleep Alone
You can read the other 11 posts featuring the greatest tips, advice, and inspiration I accumulated in my MFA Notebooks, here.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 11. Meredith Hall on What's Missing

Not counting my own writing, I filled eight notebooks over two years while completing an MFA program. They are crammed with great writing tips and insights gleaned from faculty seminars, workshops, graduating student presentations, and visiting writer talks. Feeling nostalgic, I've been wandering through them at random, and posting parts here.

What is not on the page weighs as much, counts as much, matters as, as what is on the page. What you don't include is so important. You can see this very clearly in a segmented (also called a montage or collage) essay, where white space divides and acts as a buffer, and allows you to move between narrative, reflection, and scenes, in the same way as looking through a photo album. There is time to pause and consider before moving on. It seems to me a very organic form for the writer and a very intuitive form for the reader. The key is: no transitions. You can move between times and places, from memory to present, from image to introspection to metaphor. -- Meredith Hall, author of Without A Map, and Memoirist-in-Residence at University of New Hampshire

The first ten posts in the MFA Notebooks series are here.

Gold in Them Notebooks: Part 10

In these posts, I offer golden nuggets I heard from faculty members and visiting writers, which I scribbled into notebooks during my MFA program a few years back.

The following tidbits are from the first day of my first residency, and during that wonderful, tortuous session, I wasn't quite as careful to note who said what.

-The story must begin in the first sentence of the first page. Don't clear your throat. -Ground it in specifics before letting metaphors fly.
-Master the rules. Then forget them.
-The main character has to want something that seems somewhat unattainable.
-What's at stake? Is the character going through something difficult and can the reader root for him/her?
-There must be setbacks.
-The hunger to see things in a humorous way is a universal need for readers, even (or especially) in an otherwise sad story.
-- I believe he or she may have been paraphrasing Robert McKee.

The rest of the MFA Notebooks series can be found here.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 9

"Gold in Them Notebooks" is a continuing, though sporadic, series of posts, featuring what I find while randomly looking through the notebooks I filled during my MFA program. The rest of the series can be found here.

As part of a seminar titled, "Stay Happily Writing," focused on keeping future MFA grads actively writing, we were urged to:

- List five writing-related goals each for the next month, the next year, and the next five years.
- Speaking as your own inner critic, write out why you won't or can't accomplish these.
- Now, addressing that inner critic, write why and how you will work toward making these goals happen.
- Give yourself three gifts as a writer: Read some good literature every day. Write something every day. Be teachable.
- Write the author flap copy for your first book. For your second book.
- Always be open to new suggestions and ideas -- about your writing, your goals, opportunities, volunteer projects. Try it. You never know.

- Leslea Newman, editor, writing teacher, and author of 50+ books, including children's books, young adult novels, poetry, writing craft, adult novels, essay and short story collections.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 8. Nonfiction Blues: I, Me, My, Mine

Paging through a notebook from my final semester of my MFA program in creative nonfiction, I am reminded of a conversation with a faculty member. I was slogging through the fourth revision to a manuscript of a memoir in linked essays.

Me: I'm getting really sick of myself. If I write one more sentence with the pronoun 'I' in it, I may vomit.

Her: Good. Excellent.

Me: Huh?

Her: Now start thinking about the reader. Think about how your story can mean something to others. Think about what you have to say, rather than writing about what happened to you.

Not new advice, of course. But sometimes, we hear something again, and the timing is just right.

That advice spurred me to change the openings and revise the endings to several of the essay-chapters. Scenes were edited and got more interesting. Several secondary characters emerged and made big contributions. Hinted-at themes came into clear focus. I began to think of the manuscript as a cohesive piece of work, intended for readers, instead of a bunch of my stories. No vomiting ensued.

The rest of the Gold in Them Notebooks posts, in which I pass on some tips mined from my MFA program notebooks, can be found here.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 7

Lately, I've been finding inspiration in the dog-eared pages of my old MFA notebooks, and sharing with my readers some of the good advice I'm finding there.

From a seminar on story in creative nonfiction:

• The apparent subject lies on the surface, neat and calm. The real story lies underneath. It's very messy and has emotional urgency. Always keep asking yourself, "What's the real story?"
• Some reasons writers often don't get to the real story – shame, fear, laziness, the inner critic, time; not yet understanding the real story; not ready to deal with the real story.
• To uncover the real story, alter the way you look at things. Read other material – read what you love, and see what opens the doors. Be like a bloodhound; keep sniffing around, keep moving; do free writing to find what moves you.
• How to know when it's not there yet: You're bored. You are relying on writing and not on story. It feels dutiful. You are unable to title it. You can't imagine an ideal reading audience for the piece.

--Barbara Hurd, literary nonfiction essayist and mentor extraordinaire

The first six MFA Notebooks posts can be found here.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 6

No kidding, I've been paging through notebooks from my MFA days, and randomly posting what I find. The first five in the series are here.

From a workshop on humor writing:

Underwrite.
Ramp up details that are strange.
Bring irony into sharp focus.
Juxtapose.
Let the humor come from the material.
Edit for timing.

Tanya Barrientos, novelist, former Philadelphia Inquirer humor columnist, and NPR essayist

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 5

The stack of notebooks I'm keeping near my desk this summer are from my MFA days, and I'm enjoying opening them at random and posting what I find.

From a question-and-answer session following a faculty presentation:

•Remember that form and genre is often determined not so much by the writer but
by how the writing is presented to us, how it's marketed to the reader.
•Characters are the symbols which move a story along.
•Commit to a length but leave space for doubt and for accidents (which aren't).
•Think of language as a character too.
•In some cases, theme, style, and structure can carry as much or even more than plot.
- Kazim Ali, poet, novelist and nonfiction writer

You can read the first four installments of the MFA notebooks posts here.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 4

Welcome to the fourth in a series of posts on what I find while taking a random cruise through a pile of notebooks from my MFA program.

From a discussion during a nonfiction workshop about writing while feeling stuck:

•Try this: Keep writing this sentence, filling in the blanks anew each time: "Part of me wants _____, but part of me wants _____."
•When you feel you can't write about something, write at it. Write in pieces – individual sentences, paragraphs.
•When you have something (or even if you think you don't) make your margins very wide and print it out, with text running down the center of the page only, so you can write in longhand on the sides of the paper (especially transitions), then…get some scissors and literally cut and paste. See what happens.
•Ask yourself if there is a part of you that is hiding behind the stuff you are not writing.
•Forget about explaining a concept like "forgiveness" – do it with scene, image, moment, emotional clarity.
- Richard Hoffman, memoirist and poet; Writer in Residence, Emerson College.

You can read the first three MFA notebooks posts here.

Gold in Them Notebooks, Part 3

The is the third in a continuing series of posts presenting writing advice I'm finding as I randomly flip through several years of notebooks, including those from my MFA program.

Today's notes are from a session on writing the personal essay:

Think longer before you begin writing.
Don't "wind up" on the page. Know what you want to write first.
Periods don't cost money.
Unfold the story like dealing a deck of cards; turn over only one at a time.
End a sentence with the most powerful word.
Think of scenes in terms of visual frames; what image next? Next?
It's not that interesting for the reader to hear what the writer doesn't know.
Write as you'd talk, only say less.
Trust the reader to get it.
- Joyce Maynard, author of the new novel Labor Day, and of this past Sunday's
Modern Love column in the New York Times

You can read the first and second installments here.

Gold in Them There Notebooks, Part 2

As I explained yesterday, I'm randomly leafing through all the notebooks I filled during the two years I spent in an MFA program, and posting what I find.

Here, a few gems, in no particular order, from a faculty presentation.

•When writing dialogue, leave out anything the reader can intuit from previous dialogue. Stop before the reader is really ready to leave the scene.
•Change pace.
•Alternate sentence structure.
•Please leave out all the boring details and descriptions of everyday activities, such as "she got into bed," "he got in the car."
•Don't try so hard to explain things. When the writing is good, the reader will be engaged.
•Incongruity is more interesting than symmetry.

– Kelly Link, author of the short story collections, Magic for Beginners and Stranger Things Happen, and winner of Nebula, Hugo, and Small Fantasy Awards

Gold in Them There Notebooks, Part I

Over the last month or so – the time when I would have, in previous years, been prepping for and then attending the summer residency portion of my MFA program – I've been nostalgic. Missing the anticipation and nerves and frantic reading and critiquing leading up to the intense 11-day session, and longing for another chance at the mother lode of knowledge, camaraderie, motivation, and magic which made up each day.

This week, while in the middle of a massive office reorganization project, I had the chance to unearth the notebooks I filled over the two years I spent in that program. There's one from each residency, and one from each semester in between. Residency notebooks are filled with notes from faculty seminars, peer workshops, visiting author talks, guest lectures, and graduating student presentations, as well as tidbits culled from conversations during lunch, carpool rides, and evening coffees. Semester notebooks include advice from my faculty mentors on my work-in-progress, and ideas for the annotations I needed to produce on a dozen books.

Opening those notebooks brings up many mixed emotions, but the overriding sense is one of finding treasure. Sure, I have already acted on much of the advice, incorporated many of the tips and techniques into my writing process, and clearly remember some of the best-phrased counsel. But I was amazed at how much I had either forgotten or filed away in a far part of my brain.

Rather than read through each notebook from beginning to end, I thought it might be more fun, over the next few weeks, to open them up in a completely unsystematic and arbitrary way, and see what I'd find. And, I'll blog about it.

First up -- from a seminar on vision and a possible approach to the prewriting process:

Get a huge sheet of paper or white board. I call it a Chaos Board. Write down all the key words about your subject. Have absolutely no order. Write words, prompts, ideas. Sketch in visual things too. Keep it uncensored. Use placeholders if you can't think of the exact idea. Make sets and subsets. Make word webs, by drawing connecting lines between words and phrases. Notice the high traffic areas. - Debra Marquart, author of The Horizontal World: Growing up Wild in the Middle of Nowhere