Perhaps art is seeing the obvious in such a new light that the old becomes new.
--Madeleine l'Engle. WALKING ON WATER, p175.
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Behold, I make all things new.
--Jesus, in the aptly-named book of Revelation.
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I've learned a ton about art this past decade or so. We've been to museums and galleries in San Diego, Tucson, Phoenix, Oklahoma City, Chicago, Boston, and both the Portland and Colby Museums here in Maine. I've been fascinated recently in reading about the intersections of art and world history...and literature, architecture and culture.
Applying the term "art" to all the creative enterprises, l'Engle offers a valid way of getting under one roof all of our open-ended, imagination-fueled pursuits, from painting to poetry, from sculpting to scripting. She also recognizes that there are creative, non-rule-bound creative leaps in the sciences, be they nuclear physics or sub-cellular mechanisms, brilliant computer programming, or the solution to Fermat's "unsolvable" Last Theorem.
Okay, perhaps that's a bit windy--let's try again: Madeleine sees creativity everywhere, in all jobs and tasks. Some jobs are more up-front in the use and need for creativity--other jobs require the worker to be creative in order to not die of boredom!
I also like Madeleine's observations on our reactions to disorder:
--some see chaos and bring cosmos out of chaos.
--others, seeing chaos, only reproduce chaos in their art.
I'd add to l'Engle's thoughts:
--there are probably many more who, trapped inside chaos, cannot escape it and thus are chaos.
For those of you who like word games...turn "OLD" into "NEW" via one-letter substitutions in the fewest steps possible.
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mebbe not the shortest, but after a coupla missteps:
Okay, weird title, but, Elizabeth tells me I've got a weird sense of humor...
The following is a quote from Dan Blank, writing for Writer Unboxed:
There is No Horse and Cart. On Finding Success as a Writer
I worry that the cart &
horse analogy is exactly the type of social contract that has long since
broken, if it ever existed at all. That you do well in grade school and
high school to get into a good college to get a good internship to get a
good job which leads to a good promotion which leads to a good salary
which leads to a nice house which leads to retirement savings which
leads to…this concept that there is a basic, safe, linear order to things that leads to “success.”
Instead, what I have found from
my friends and colleagues: life is complex; trusting relationships are
the core of everything; great work is highly respected, but not always
rewarded; persistence is key; luck is necessary, but unpredictable;
‘best practices’ are often illusions sold to you so that others can feel
like gurus.
“They say most businesses fail in the two years. That most books don’t
sell many copies. Why is this surprising? The interesting things in life
are hard. Do you want an interesting life? Then you have to accept
different odds.”
[end quote.]
+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+#+
My only point of disagreement would be to cut the title to..."On Finding Success." The "as a Writer" is unnecessary, eh?
So, what do I need to do differently in order to write more and sell more? Hmmmmm, I am going to pump up my relationships, get a tad more pushy in selling, and write more, every day. I've done a great job this yr of sticking with my "Poem a Day" writing, but the fiction-writing needs more time. So....
buh-bye, gotta hitch my wagon to my horse...or, my horse to my wagon...oh, whatever......gotta go write.
Is poetry dead...or, are we merely dead to poetry?
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We don't read and write poetry because it's cute. We read and write poetry because we are members of the human race. And the human race is filled with passion. Medicine, law, business, engineering these are all noble pursuits, and necessary to sustain life. But poetry beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for. To quote from Whitman,
O me, O life of the questions of these recurring,
of the endless trains of the faithless,
of cities filled with the foolish...
What good amid these O me, O life?
Answer: that you are here.,
That life exists, and identity.
That the powerful play goes on,
and you may contribute a verse.
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as recited by Robin Williams' character
Dead Poets' Society (1989)
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I think we spend a lot of life focused on those "noble pursuits" mentioned above, but we spend the remainder of our time on ignoble pursuits that simply salve the savage beast within. IMHO, the savage beast, like a child or a clock, needs to be wound up and set to RUN!
The creative pursuits, when passively flickering in front of our eyeballs, don't do much for us due to that very passivity--sitting on the recliner or bed, watching the images somebody else has dreamed up for us to watch. Okay, I know, we're not all masterly poets, dramatists, sculptors, painters, or novelists...but, look at this for an example of happy people, out creating art and loving it!
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I paint with words
I follow a meter
I brush my keys
words flying fleeter,
pictures emerge
oft rather hazy...
and even for me
words can sound crazy.
I'll try again
it's cheaper'n paint
and no one to tell me,
"isn't," not "ain't"!
I paint with words
hold still, little birds!
(Sorry to be slow--I started this as a minor tribute to Robin Williams, then company showed up and blogging took a seat way in the back of the bus. Appropriately so, but still a bit frustrating.)
Half-year report (stats as of 6/30/14):
# 77 books read (he's on a record pace, woo-hoo!)
Best book I read this year:
(I know, I'm supposed to say, "The Bible." Duh...yes, I do include the Bible every yr that I read it cover-to-cover = most years = 9 times in the last 11 years...which is the extent of my spreadsheet. Wish I'd started keeping track of all my reading sooner!)
--Best Literary Fiction: .........Jodi Picoult's 19 MINUTES.
--Best Thriller: ......................S. King's DR. SLEEP (Sequel to THE SHINING.)
--Best Non-fiction: .................E. B. White's 1977 ESSAYS. These are like music!
I'd love to hear about your favs for the yr...or, the decade...or...life?
(for my life, surely Tolkien's LOTR and CSLewis' Narnia and his Space Trilogy. I have reread them all so many times...in fact, I feel the urge coming on yet again to immerse myself in Middle Earth!)
13 Writing Tools To Instantly Enhance The Quality of Your Blog
John O'Nolan
on the
in Writing
There's one thing that separates great blog posts from the rest: Giving the reader what they truly, deeply want.
If you find yourself writing post after post but being less than
overwhelmed by the response, it might be time to sharpen up those
blogging techniques and try something new.
No other format of writing is so diverse in its distribution, and no
other format has such massive reach with such a low barrier to entry. But that doesn't mean it's easy.
The internet is as busy and crowded as its ever been. There have
never been more bloggers clamouring for attention than you will find
today. Quality and credibility, now, are the driving differentiators.
So that's what these 12 tools are about. Helping you understand what
factors make the difference between the viral blog and the single-celled
internet Amoeba.
Tell your story
Your story is the thing that makes people care about what you're
saying. Or not. It's the bit that makes it possible for your reader to
relate to you. To become a part of it, rather than just a party to it.
It is, in many ways, the magic that holds all written content together.
Blogging about business, Alex Turnbull found that almost 300% more people read to the end of a post on the GrooveHQ blog when he included conscious narrative elements in the introduction.
Thanks to science, our brains are hard-wired to relate to stories
more than any other type of content. We don't just read and understand a
story, we place ourselves into it and go along for the ride.
This is not the logical part of the brain, it's the emotional part.
When it comes to decision-making, it's the emotions that win almost
every time.
Be direct
The easiest type of writing, and the easiest type of speaking, is
rambling. Run-on sentences and meandering paragraphs are sure to
accomplish one thing very successfully: boring your reader.
Every year the average human attention span shortens. Online, this
paradigm is magnified intensely. This year, the average attention span
of a web user is down to just 8 seconds; roughly equivalent to a goldfish.
You have but a short window in which to capture the attention of your
reader and communicate something important to them. Now, more than
ever, is the time to be blunt about it.
Get to the point
They say the most important part of video editing is the first 10-seconds. The same is true for blogging, translated roughly to the first 3 sentences.
Before you can even start being direct, you have to get your
reader past the first paragraph. Why should they bother to read any
further if you can't capture their attention in the first place?
Try opening with your conclusion. Share the point of your post right
up front, then the tell the story of how you got there. Surprise,
intrigue and controversy are all things which keep people reading.
Show, don't tell
Use words to drive home the point you want to make. Back up those words with images which prove what you're saying is true.
It can be hard to find an image for every context, but when it's
possible it has a significant effect. Humans (especially lazy humans,
like us web users) are very visual creatures.
A study by Buffer found that Tweets with images received 150% more retweets than their counterparts without.
Jeff Bullas points out
that (on average) articles with images get 94% more total views, press
releases with images get 45% more views, and on Facebook stories with
images are shared 37% more often.
Set the scene
Close your eyes for a moment and imagine this:
You're sat, quietly, watching your monitor in stunned disbelief. You
didn't expect it. You didn't realise that this was going to happen to
you today. Your hand shakes as you reach for the mouse and hit "Reply".
Your server hiccups indignantly under the load of a million visitors.
You only write two words: "Thanks, @aplusk." Wouldn't that be nice?
Help your reader explore their imagination. Place them into the
picture which you're painting and make them the main character. Be
selfless to allow your reader to be selfish.
Arrange your words
One of the most common errors which newbie bloggers make is to ignore
(or rather, not pay extra special attention to) formatting. Arguably,
formatting has the largest influence of all on how much (and what parts)
of your post are read.
If the user who spends 8 seconds on a page is our most common visitor, the second most common is the skim-reader.
You can complain about how unfair it is that nobody can be bothered
to read properly any more, or you can see it as an opportunity and a
challenge. Can you communicate the most important parts of your post to
someone on a subway, looking at a tiny screen, in the space of just 1-2
minutes?
Break up your big blocks of text into manageable chunks. Use headings as a roadmap of where you're going. Try highlighting the most important passages which you would like people to notice.
It really works.
Reference the things
Just because it's written on the internet doesn't necessarily mean it's true. Why should I believe you?
Support your stories and opinions with facts. Call it "data driven" -
call it "backed by science" - call it whatever you want. Reliable
information is often hard to come by. Demonstrating that you are a
credible authority on your subject of choice is a sure-fire way to
dramatically up the quality of your posts.
Less hearsay. More juicy footnotes.
Social proof
Who else has talked about this subject? Surround yourself with people
who are smart and if you're lucky you might be considered smart by
association. Citing experts in the field which you're writing about
indicates that you know who is worth citing.
All of this takes practice, of course, but the KISSmetrics blog has some great advice about how to ask influencers for killer quotes as just one example of how you can bolster your writing with credibility.
Because:
1) you gain exposure to a new audience, and 2) your content becomes
more reputable because you’re associating yourself with an influencer in
your industry.
Compare & contrast
Occasionally the best way to communicate something new is to point
out the similarities and differences between it and something old. Take a
concept which is easy to relate to and subvert it.
You see this in startups all the time when they write elevator pitches to communicate what they do in the fastest way possible:
"It's basically Twitter, for photographs"
"Basecamp, for musicians"
"Paypal, but not shit"
Building on a reference point which is already known and understood can often cause an "aha" moment of understanding.
Summarise
Many of your readers are going to skim read, and some aren't going to
read at all. Most people who do read anything, however, will read the
first and the last paragraphs of your post.
Try to summarise all of your most important points in the
introduction and the conclusion. Even if it's an abridged version, you
should be able to cover all your bases.
Keep it succinct.
Call to action
Your call to action is the thing that you want people to do after having read your post. What is that?
Do you want them to read another post? Buy a product? Leave a review? Click on a link? Think about something important? Your call to action should be crystal clear, and easy to find
(regardless of what it is). Your post is effectively one big build up
to the call to action. The thing that the reader should do next.
It often helps if there's a brightly coloured button.
Practice
As Brian Clark rightly points out, there are only 10 effective steps to becoming a better writer:
Write.
Write more.
Write even more.
Write even more than that.
Write when you don’t want to.
Write when you do.
Write when you have something to say.
Write when you don’t.
Write every day.
Keep writing.
What to do next
Probably not everything at the same time! It might be easier to focus
on perfecting the use of these techniques one by one until you start to
feel comfortable jumping between them. Give yourself time to get
acquainted.
Have a look at some of the blogs which you read every day. Can you spot any of these tools in action?
Go back over one of your posts and see if you can revise any sections to be more clear and concise.
Decide what you would like your readers to understand or accomplish as a result of reading your writing. Does the rest of your post reinforce that mission?
