Hello Readers,
Please bear with me as I shake off the summer rust and come to terms with the fact that I have to follow Alli on the blog schedule. This summer was not a summer of writing for me-- and this fact, under the egotistic assumption that you care about my writing career, is sure to disturb you, but fear not! A summer of not writing does not imply a summer of complacency (much to the contradiction of my blog's title).
This summer I've been to the other side of the world, recorded an EP, and synthesized a freshman composition course. I feel like those first two things are a bit more interesting, so I should probably save them for a book, which leaves you to hear about that last accomplishment (the most boring one) for the rest of the school year. But hey, I'll try to keep it in.
Plus, I don't find gushing about myself on a public forum very rewarding; however, it does bring some advice to the front of my brain, which I can pass on to you. There was a literary critic (whose name escapes me) who commented that Lord Byron was such a good poet because he had the life experience to back it up. As a person who was drawn to literature by the beat movement, I find statements like this to be true. Kerouac, Ginsberg, and Burroughs wouldn't have really written anything that changed the face of the canon had they not had genuinely wild lives. Given, some of their best chapters were written about them lounging around the living room.
So, life experience is certainly not the cornerstone of good writing, but it sure does help. Especially when it comes to creative non-fiction. Inspiration can be found anywhere, and, for us booky people, it's usually found in books (and in one recent embarrassing case, while watching Ghost Adventures on TV. Have you heard of stone tape theory? It's interesting, look it up), but sometimes it's good to get outside of the house. It's also a great way to guard some intellectual property; chances are, nobody shares the same adventures that you have in your life, and if they have, they probably didn't see it the way you did. My adventures? Well, I've met the Listener face to face.
Anyway, get out there and live your life, and then write about it.
I'll leave you with a challenge: it has just dawned on me that, though we are open to publishing creative non-fiction, we haven't actually published any. Send us some of the good stuff, so we can include it someday.
'Till then,
-Rainamoinen
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