Dani Shapiro on Vulnerability, the Creative Impulse, the Writing Life, and How to Live with Presence. By Maria Popova.
Susan Cain: How I Write. Pixar’s 22 Rules of Storytelling. These rules were originally tweeted by Emma Coats, Pixar’s Story Artist.
Number 9 on the list – When you’re stuck, make a list of what wouldn’t happen next – is a great one and can apply to writers in all genres. You admire a character for trying more than for their successes.You gotta keep in mind what’s interesting to you as an audience, not what’s fun to do as a writer. They can be very different.Trying for theme is important, but you won’t see what the story is actually about til you’re at the end of it. The Best of TED: 5 Public Speaking Lessons From 30 Years Of Spreading Ideas. As the annual TED conference is about to celebrate its 30th anniversary next week, the popularity of TED talks has never been higher--viewers now download or stream presentations on TED.com up to 2 million times per day.
After analyzing 500 of the most popular TED talks (more than 150 hours) and speaking directly to many of TED’s most successful speakers, I’ve discovered that the best TED presentations share several components. Here's how you can harness them to transform any pitch or presentation: 1. Dig deep to identify your true passion. In March 2010 University of Waterloo professor Larry Smith gave a funny, blunt, and passionate talk titled, “Why you will fail to have a great career.” Future of Storytelling Course. Are you interested in the mechanics of current fiction formats?
Do you want to know how stories are told? Do you want to analyze, understand, contextualize and create stories and narratives? Then join our MOOC and share our passion for storytelling! Reinventing the way stories are told. Future of Storytelling Course. Sketchnoting Talk at WebExpo 2010 in Prague. What is it?
Note taking is about capturing a line of thoughts (from a talk, a video, a book or your own head) to be able to go back to it later and remember the points that are interesting to you. And instead of capturing in pages and pages of written word, sketchnotes are a visual style of note taking that allows for all kinds of visual expression to create richer and more engaging notes. (I’ll get to the building blocks later.) 69, Gabriel Garcia Marquez. Gabriel García Márquez was interviewed in his studio/office located just behind his house in San Angel Inn, an old and lovely section, full of the spectacularly colorful flowers of Mexico City.
The studio is a short walk from the main house. A low elongated building, it appears to have been originally designed as a guest house. Within, at one end, are a couch, two easy chairs, and a makeshift bar—a small white refrigerator with a supply of acqua minerale on top. The most striking feature of the room is a large blown-up photograph above the sofa of García Márquez alone, wearing a stylish cape and standing on some windswept vista looking somewhat like Anthony Quinn. García Márquez was sitting at his desk at the far end of the studio.
The interview took place over the course of three late-afternoon meetings of roughly two hours each. Learn To Sketchnote. Opening lines. Opening lines are the initial portions of dialogue or text in a written book often constituted by at least the first sentence or a fragment thereof.
A good opening line, or incipit, is usually considered desirable. A number of them are so well-known that they are remembered long after the book, while others are so famous that they can end up parodied. A[edit] I sing of arms and the man, he who, exiled by fate,first came from the coast of Troy to Italy, and to Lavinian shores – hurled about endlessly by land and sea, by the will of the gods, by cruel Juno’s remorseless anger, long suffering also in war, until he founded a city and brought his gods to Latium: from that the Latin people came, the lords of Alba Longa, the walls of noble Rome. Sketchnotes. I've been hired by conference and event organizers to capture sketchnotes, live and in real-time, including GE, Summit Series, Leadercast, SXSW Interactive, An Event Apart, JESS3 and SEED Conference.
I'd love to capture your next event with live sketchnotes or from recorded audio or video. Send a note and let's talk. The Sketchnote Handbook. Hand Lettering Pens, Pencils & Brushes by seanwes. Inside Amtrak's (Absolutely Awesome) Plan to Give Free Rides to Writers. Update: Julia Quinn, Amtrak's Director of Social Media, offered a few new details on the program during a Reddit AMA.
Amtrak has begun offering "writers’ residencies" to, well, writers – long roundtrip rides aboard Amtrak trains dedicated solely for the purpose of writing. After New York City-based writer Jessica Gross took the first "test-run" residency, traveling from NYC to Chicago and back, Amtrak confirmed that it is indeed planning to turn the writers' residencies into an established, long-term program, sending writers on trains throughout its network of routes. How much my novel cost me — Debt Ridden.
“I’M AFRAID TO LEAVE YOU HERE,” Bennett told me Sunday night.
He’d stayed for the weekend, settling me in, chauffeuring me to neighboring towns to stockpile food and supplies. Another friend would arrive on Friday, and Keith the Friday after that, so I wouldn’t be completely alone. But I would be alone a lot. Style Sheet: A Conversation with My Copyeditor. I’ve fallen in love with my copyeditor Susan Bradanini Betz. Not only did she find all the mantle/mantel homonym errors in my novel manuscript, she also helped me with my commas and discovered a couple of embarrassing inconsistencies. (“First she had a briefcase,” one of her notes reads. The Image Top 25 Contemporary Writers of Faith List. Life Left of West: Forest Woodward Explores the American West » Filson Life.
Photographer Forest Woodward sets out in a recently purchased — and barely running — ’77 International Scout to discover what’s left of the pioneering spirit in the American West. Along the route, a long stretch of highway from Southern Utah to Northwest Montana, Forest and his co-pilot Jessica Lowe are privy to roadside breakdowns, run-ins with remnants of the real West, and incredible scenery awash with history. Below, follow their documentation and insights in to what is truly Left of the West. Eureka, UT || Picked up an old ’77 Scout down in Southern Utah figuring it would carry us North to Montana to begin a photo project exploring what’s left of the pioneering spirit that drew Americans West. As it turned out, it only carried us as far as Eureka. New Year's Resolution Reading List: 9 Essential Books on Reading and Writing.
By Maria Popova Dancing with the absurdity of life, or what symbolism has to do with the osmosis of trash and treasure. Hardly anything does one’s mental, spiritual, and creative health more good than resolving to read more and write better. Today’s reading list addresses these parallel aspirations. And since the number of books written about reading and writing likely far exceeds the reading capacity of a single human lifetime, this omnibus couldn’t be — shouldn’t be — an exhaustive list. It is, instead, a collection of timeless texts bound to radically improve your relationship with the written word, from whichever side of the equation you approach it. How To Be Prolific: Guidelines For Getting It Done From Joss Whedon. Note: This article is also included in our year-end creative wisdom round-up. Few people get things done in as consistent and impressive a fashion as Joss Whedon. His Avengers was the rare superhero movie to break box office records as it garnered critical acclaim.
Richard Swanson died while trying to walk from Seattle to Brazil for the 2014 World Cup - how far did he want to break away? Jack Kerouac's List of 30 Beliefs and Techniques for Prose and Life. Where have you gone, Edward Abbey? Mention the name Edward Abbey among literary folk in Manhattan, and they give you looks of condescension and pity, thinking you’ve mispronounced the name of a well-known playwright. In the five years I lived in New York almost no one I met had read him. In this part of the world, west of the Mississippi and east of the left coast, mention Cactus Ed and people’s eyes light up with either fury or reverence. Larry McMurtry anointed him the Thoreau of the American West. The Deep Surface: A Note on Edward Abbey and Wendell Berry. Tweet Tweet Rock Island, IL In the introduction to Desert Solitaire Edward Abbey denied any interest in “true underlying reality, having never met any.” A Few Words in Favour of Edward Abbey. Return to North Glen or Reading List or Credo.
‘My Bright Abyss,’ by Christian Wiman. How to choose a novel: the page 69 test. Five Manifestos for the Creative Life. Famous Authors’ Handwritten Outlines for Great Works of Literature. Sacramental poetics : The Other Journal. Partaking in the Holy Mysteries: An Interview with Scott Cairns, Part II Scott Cairns is a poet whose work connects past and present, whose journey evokes faith and mystery.
S guide to writing a memoir. What makes a great essay? Your Guide To Scrivener. Learn to use the ultimate writing software: Scrivener. Allowing you to combine the various elements that make up your writing project, from outlines to research to note, Scrivener helped author Nicole Dionisio write two novels in a single year. 5 Timeless Books of Insight on Fear and the Creative Process. Books.Blog – Should We Aim to Be “Wide Achievers” in Our Careers? 3 Things I Now Want As A Man. Never Open a Book with the Weather: Writing Advice from Elmore Leonard. How Lawrence Krauss Came Into Being with Sketchnotes of Our Interview with the Theoretical Physicist. Sherman Alexie on Living Outside Borders. Scorsese’s Interest: “What About the Soul and the Heart?” Write Till You Drop.
Creative Writing Extras. Creative Writing Extras. The Quiet Act of Attention. The Ultimate Guide to Writing Better Than You Normally Do. News about the world's best tool for writers.
Touched by Evil - Joseph O'Neil. Elmore Leonard’s 10 Rules of Writing.