My Writerly Life

  • HARDING – AUTHOR OR DRUMMER?

    Back in the early 2000s, Paul Harding left the world of music, got an MFA from the Iowa writers’ Workshop, and wrote his first novel—Tinkers—about an itinerant Maine peddler in the 1800s. The book won the 2010 Pulitzer and launched Harding’s career as a university Prof, adding one more facet to his life.  If you… Read more

  • MELANCHOLY VERSE

    To the Greeks, melancholia was one of the four humors to be avoided—a black bile that brought on an unhealthy state of sadness, fear, mania; a condition that was negative and to be avoided. Over time, humans came to realize that there were appropriate times to be melancholy; to reflect; to grieve. I tend toward… Read more

  • COMING THROUGH SLAUGHTER

    Michael Ondaatje is a Sri-Lankan born Canadian poet and novelist best known for The English Patient, which won the Booker Prize and was made into an award-winning film. Ondaatje writes thought-provoking, lyrical novels about outsiders, the “other” – which makes his books rich for analysis and study. His early novella, Coming Through Slaughter, tells the… Read more

  • HAMLET BY ANOTHER NAME

    I came to William Shakespeare late in life, when pursuing a second Bachelor’s and then an MFA in literature. Multiple studies of the Bard were required at Portland’s Liberal Arts school, Marylhurst University. In those classes, I learned of the magnitude of Shakespeare’s contribution to literature–the timeless lessons on the nature of humans. Later, I… Read more