"Reading is the creative center of a writer's life." — Stephen King
December 24, 2015
They didn’t invite Anders Breivik to see their pets because they knew that he tortured his pet rats by poking them with pencils. One of Us: The Story of Anders Breivik and the Massacre in Norway provides layers of details about the man who killed 77 people … Read More
December 17, 2015
So often, I see my students take an adversarial stance when they sit down to write. They use phrases such as “grinding it out” and “forcing it” to describe how they work. Sometimes that’s been my experience, too. But does it have to be? What if we … Read More
December 10, 2015
This book aims to answer that question by outlining a “sustainable, cost-effective way to support faculty who want to improve college teaching” (1). The lead author is Gail O. Mellow, president of LaGuardia Community College, who helped developed a system that is based on self-reflection, a … Read More
November 26, 2015
Today is Thanksgiving Day — the perfect time to acknowledge with gratitude The Writer’s Almanac, American Life in Poetry, and the Poetry Foundation. These organizations email poems to thousands of people like me who wish to read new work by new poets every day. I … Read More
November 19, 2015
This book is based on the author’s research, conducted over a period of 20 years, on the work habits of faculty members. He studied the behavioral patterns of academics as they taught, wrote, and interacted with their colleagues. From this, he developed a set of strategies that … Read More
November 12, 2015
Researchers now believe that the average daydream is 14 seconds long, and we have about 2,000 of them each day (11). Scientists used to believe that humans dreamed in a story-like way only during their REM sleep cycles; it’s now thought that story-like dreams occur independent of … Read More
November 5, 2015
It defies the imagine: Karl Ove Knausgaard, a writer from Norway, has caught the attention of the Wall Street Journal. An article in the WSJ’s magazine named him the “2015 Literary Innovator,” declaring that he was “quite probably in line to receive a Nobel Prize” for … Read More
October 23, 2015
I spent most of the last decade in the company of people who are passionate about the art and science of teaching. It was wonderful. Looking back, one of the ideas that still resonates with me came from Parker J. Palmer’s The Courage to Teach. … Read More
October 15, 2015
What makes a light novel, such as this one, satisfying? Texture, I think, can have a lot to do with it. While the plot is thin — The Queen of England decides to leave the palace for a day — the author incorporates photos from actual events, … Read More
October 8, 2015
Zbigniew Herbert was 15 when Germany invaded Poland. It’s hard to imagine what it was like to grow up in the resistance. He became one of the most respected poets of Poland, and had a tremendous influence on younger writers. He advised them to detach themselves … Read More
October 1, 2015
Negotiations often start with the question “What do you want?” The more important question, according to the authors of this classic book on negotiation theory, is “Why do you want that?” Understanding the interests that determine the positions is critical when searching for a wise solution. It … Read More
September 24, 2015
Bad writing has many symptoms, but only one primary cause, according to John R. Trimble, University Distinguished Teaching Professor Emeritus at UT-Austin. The problem comes from the writer’s failure to be guided by the needs of the reader. Many novice writers, he notes, don’t understand the … Read More
September 22, 2015
William Zinsser, author of Writing About Your Life, continues, “Only small pieces of a life make an interesting memoir.” Rather than attempting to write about important periods of history, “be content to tell your small portion of a larger story.” (16) Choose to write about … Read More
