Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label writing. Show all posts

Thursday, April 14, 2022

Have you visited JCCFS? Now is the time.

 My friends, if you have never been to the John C. Campbell Folk School in Brasstown, NC, you must put it on your calendar to spend time there.

The school began in the 1930s as a replica of Folk Schools in Denmark, Sweden, and other countries, but has grown tremendously since its birth when the natives of Clay and Cherokee County gave land and labor to build it

One of our NCWN members, Dr. Eugene Hirsch, who was from Pennsylvania, but owned a mountain cabin near Murphy, NC, was a poet as well as a renowned doctor. On one of his trips down south, Gene Hirsch spent a week taking a class at the folk school in Brasstown. Like most of us locals, he fell in love with the casual, friendly, and enthusiastic people there and continued to take classes, but he thought this would be a great place for a writing program. 

He talked to the director of the school and soon there were writing classes on the schedule. Our own Nancy Simpson served as Resident Writer and she brought some of the best poets, novelists, and nonfiction writers to the little town of Brasstown, a place they might never have heard of if not for the writing program at John Campbell. I am fortunate to have been a student there many times over the years and to have taught writing there. Some of my happiest times were at the John C. Campbell Folk School, and I met people who have become life-long friends.

This photograph is of one of the first classes I taught at JCCFS in 2008

I have never been able to put into words the feelings I had while attending and the feelings I had when I left. Your classmates or your students become like family as you share common interests such as weaving, painting, cooking, dancing, playing instruments, and writing. I am reading a memoir by Betty Brown, a fellow student I met in a writing class at John Campbell a decade ago. She is well known as a visual artist also. I find that she is an excellent writer. 

Below is the writing schedule for this year. I know most of these writers and some are long-time friends of mine. Make a pledge to yourself to spend a week or a weekend in a writing class with one of the fantastic writers who will be your instructor. You will stay in a comfortable cabin with other students. You will share meals from the dining room and you will attend gatherings outside now because of COVID. Visit their website and read the catalog. I promise you if you spend time there enjoying a craft of your choosing, making friends, and learning more about yourself, you will make memories that will be with you always.

For those of us who live in counties near the school, we can come home at night.  The tuition is half of the price paid by others.

Click on this link to see what is happening in the writing classes.


CLASSES WITH MEDIA CODES THAT CONTAIN WRITING

SUBJECT 
INSTRUCTOR 
CLASS TITLE 
DATE 
Writing
Rosemary Royston
Creative Writing Across GenresSunday, May 8 - Saturday, May 14, 2022
Writing
Annette Clapsaddle
The Body Keeps the StorySunday, June 12 - Saturday, Jun 18, 2022
Writing
Pamela Duncan
Fiction Writing - Focus on CraftSunday, July 3 - Friday, Jul 8, 2022
Writing
Dana Wildsmith
What's in Your Writing Folder?Sunday, August 14 - Saturday, Aug 20, 2022
Writing
Darnell Arnoult
Creative Nonfiction in a FlashFriday, September 2 - Sunday, Sep 4, 2022
Writing
Valerie Nieman
The Breath of Life: Discovering and Depicting CharactersSunday, October 30 - Saturday, Nov 5, 2022
Writing
Bobbie Pell
Poetry - The Wonders of NatureFriday, November 18 - Sunday, Nov 20, 2022


Monday, November 29, 2021

When should you say, "I am a writer?"


I follow Bobbie Christmas, editor and writer, who lives in the Atlanta, Georgia area. She has earned her living as an editor and has run her own business for decades. In a post on her blog, she answers the question, "When can a person call himself or herself a writer?"

I suggest clicking on Bobbie's website, www.zebraeditor.com, and reading her blog posts, but below is part of her answer to the question.

People who are golfers read articles about golf, go to seminars about golf, and talk to other golfers about golfing. People who are writers read articles about writing, go to seminars about writing, and talk to other writers about writing. Golfers golf. Writers write. If you write, you are a writer. If you get published and/or get paid for writing, good for you, but those things aren’t the only way to determine whether you are a writer. Golfers don’t have to win the green jacket at the Masters Tournament to be considered golfers, do they?

Writers are people who have an avid interest in putting words and sentences together. It doesn’t matter if you never get paid for your writing. You write because you enjoy it, so you are a writer. It doesn’t matter if you write letters to the editor, articles for magazines, private journals never meant for the public, or bestselling novels. If you write, you are a writer."

Beginning writers always have concerns about this issue. As a writing instructor, I get questions. "I haven't published anything. Can I still identify myself as a writer?" 

I have been a writer since I was a child. I grew up wishing I were a writer, but I was a writer because I wrote stories, I wrote small books and I wrote poetry that no one read. You don't have to share your writing to be a writer. You don't have to publish your writing to be a writer. 

I think Bobbie Christmas gives us the best definition of a writer, don't you? If you write, love to write, and read about writing and writers, then you are a writer.




Thursday, November 11, 2021

Reading from New Craft Book, The Strategic Poet

Editor Diane Lockward and Terrapin Books has just published another in a series of wonderful craft books. The Strategic Poet: Honing The Craft is available on Amazon in paperback and Kindle. 

Hi, Karen Paul Holmes here! In this 4 1/2 minute video, I read "Rewinding an Overdose on a Projector," a beautiful, heartbreaking poem by Sean Shearer who won a Pushcart Prize for it. I also read my poem, "Slow-Motion, Reverse-Replay, Myocardial Infarction," inspired by his and the prompt included in the book.  

Click here to watch. And you can find out a bit more about my poetry on my website. Thank you! 

Tuesday, September 7, 2021

The Backstory of a Poem

From inspiration to revision to publishing...

First conceived in a workshop with poets Dorianne Laux and Joseph Millar, the poem, "A White Room, A Piano," then went on a journey. 

The website, Art and Humanity Framed in the Photofeature Story, features the backstory of poems, where writer/artist Christal Rice Cooper interviews poets about their step-by-step process. To see how my poem came about... and where it went, you can read the article here. You'll find lots of photos and links too. 



Saturday, August 29, 2020

Maureen Ryan Griffin interviewed on Podcast

Many of us in western NC and north Georgia have had the pleasure of taking workshops and classes with Maureen Ryan Griffin either through Netwest or John C. Campbell Folk School. Her business, WordPlay is thriving from her home in Charlotte, NC.

I have subscribed to her newsletter for many years, and today learned she was recently a guest on a podcast. You can listen to Maureen talk about her journey that led her to writing, teaching and creating her own business. You get to know the person as well as the writer.
Click on this link:  https://www.stitcher.com/podcast/rose-cast-with-dr-sara-rose/e/65202933

Visit Maureen's website: https://www.wordplaynow.com to see how you can take classes online at this time when she can't meet with you face to face. 
She is the best teacher, and she inspired me and encouraged me when I took her classes years ago. She is a generous person with her students and in her personal life. I recommend beginning writers get to know Maureen.

Tuesday, October 1, 2019

Meet our Writers' Night Out Headliners: Linda Jones & Alan Cone

October 11, 7 pm
Blairsville, GA

Open Mic follows the reading

Join us for Linda's intelligent, heartfelt poetry; and Alan's smart, quirky prose. (Read his bio below for a sample). 


Linda Grayson Jones is an Associate Professor of Biology and Dean of Math and Science at Young Harris College. She has read and written poetry since childhood and recalls reading The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes to her third-grade classmates. With a B.S. in Biology from Stetson University, an M.A. in Biology and a Ph.D. in Pathology from Vanderbilt University, Linda's career path was primarily in academic biomedical research, but in 2009 she returned to her first love—teaching. She remains a reader and writer of poetry and is a member of the North Carolina Writers’ Network. She credits North Carolina poet Nancy Simpson (1938-2018) for encouraging her to use Grayson Jones as her published poet’s name.

 Alan Cone is the author of many short stories and a novel, The History of the Decline and Fall of Roland Arnheiter. He explains that he “comes to North Georgia by way of Texas, on our nation’s frontier, where a man writes with both fists or perishes.” Alan's work is anchored always in a common man’s self-effacing humility. His penchant for dry humor and sarcasm is reflected in his artist’s statement: “With acuity and wisdom, with perceptiveness and whimsy, I usher audiences through an odyssey of freshman-level erudition and beyond. My quietly courageous abasement of the writer’s dais will leave you challenged, thoughtful, hungry for less.”  He also admits that he does not actually smoke a pipe.