I’m Not A Dog Musher: A Guest Post by Mattox Roesch

So who is Mattox Roesch. the visiting writer who'll be teaching our Fiction Workshop beginning Feb. 17?  For starters, his first novel, Sometimes We're Always Real Same-Same (Unbridled ’09), was named one of the best books of 2009 by Booklist and New West. His short fiction has appeared in numerous publications and anthologies, including The Sun, Narrative Magazine, The Missouri Review, and The Best American Nonrequired Reading. Matt received his MFA from Warren Wilson College. He currently lives with his wife and daughter in Unalakleet, Alaska. We're thrilled that while his family's in town for four weeks awaiting the birth of their next child, he has offered to share his insights on fiction writing with a lucky group of Anchorage writers.  Sign up today!

This whole dog mushing thing started as “research” for my new novel. I told myself that I am not a dog musher, but rather, a normal guy who loves dogs, who bikes and skis with his own two huskies, and who last November stumbled upon an opportunity to handle a real team and race every Saturday for the season. I’m a writer, not a dog musher. I’m still (half-heartedly) asserting this.

After losing my first race, I had to find a way to at least not lose once, to beat someone. I began thinking about paws and personalities instead of syntax and subtext. At the store I would bump into veteran mushers and talk about booties rather than good books. At church I whispered questions about watering and sled weight. I knew I was working with fantastic dogs and I simply wanted to reveal their potential through a respectable finish. On the runners, at the start of each training run and race, there was a discovery to be made—we might find the right combination of dogs, we might find the right mix of muscle and speed training, we might, eventually, beat someone. I expressed to the veteran mushers that I hoped my desire was not some supermacho deal, but rather, my way of understanding how to do right by the dogs. They told me that the healthiest and happiest and fastest teams were always the best cared for. (Then they’d tell me I was really becoming a dog musher.)

After a month of running, cooking, feeding, crashing, cursing, cooking, feeding, and racing, I told my wife that my “research” was going well. She rolled her eyes (and plugged her nose), because she knew what obsession looked (and smelled) like—staying up till 3am to finish sewing an over-parka the night before a race, running the team on overnight trips to Old Woman Cabin, studying sled designs and building my own (with much help). She asked me, “Are you writing any of this down?” I explained to her that I didn’t need to write anything down. It was all in my head. She said, “Yes. It is all in your head.”

My “research” started while drafting a new novel. Early on I discovered that one of my main characters—a fifteen-year-old girl—becomes obsessed with dog mushing to the point that she assembles her own team out of village castaways. She doesn’t simply hope to try mushing some day; she embraces it immediately, and it takes over her life. Her risk-taking journey with dogs seems to be important to the other characters’ stories, as well as to the overall story. She is the obsessed character who, for a reason I’m not quite yet sure of, acts on her obsessions.

As Charles Baxter writes in The Art of Subtext, “Without a mobilized desire or fear, characters in a story—or life—won’t be willing to do much of anything in the service of their great longings and phobias.” The odd part about this is that we don’t always need to know our characters’ deepest desires or fears before they do something in the service of their great longings and phobias—we’re not always sure what’s going on with our teenage dog mushers. Yet, something has to happen in a story and so we write that something down the way a cartographer might explore a region before drawing a map. Then, in the third or fifth or tenth revision, we might discover (and further “mobilize”) that character’s deepest motivations.

My point is that we don’t write what we’ve already figured out. We use our knowledge and experience as tools—they are simply the framework and the stage props, the circumstances. While we might understand our character’s situation, we write to discover their story. Mystery seems to be the writers’ impetus. We want to find some inarticulate part of ourselves in our characters. To verify that we are not alone in our lifelong struggle with inarticulacy, we must share our stories. So we hand our work to friends and family and editors and strangers, feeling as if something has been discovered, and hoping that they too will recognize it. When the all-too-often strained expressions and negative comments come back, the mystery seems to be Why am I doing this to myself? rather than What am I trying to discover? And yet, we know that no matter how degrading and scary it is, no matter how many times we crash and curse and chase after a runaway story, we need to keep writing and sharing our work. It’s our way of expressing the inexpressible. It’s our way of doing right by the story. It’s our way of really becoming a writer.

Workshopping is one valuable place for discovering our stories. The problem is that many of us have participated in (and been scarred by) enough bad workshops to discredit them all (fellow writers crying, fellow writers getting defensive and not listening to comments, fellow writers trashing their story). I once sat beside another student who spent the entire workshop drawing guns and ammunition after he felt his story was unjustly criticized (at the time it seemed ridiculous and a little bit funny, but now, well … ). A workshop often runs off course when it focuses too heavily on editing rather than discovering.

Yet, I hope most of us have experienced good workshops too, maybe even great ones. A writer friend of mine in Minneapolis, Eric Braun, brought the same story to our group a number of times over the course of a year. Where a lesser writer (myself, maybe) might have given up on a piece, Eric saw his story’s discovery through to its completion, and it won the $10,000 Tamarack Award. That’s not to say the point of workshop is to get published and win big money. It’s nice. But I hope the bigger satisfaction for folks like Eric is seeing a story discovered by both author and reader, whether that discovery is explicit or not. It might sound a bit fluffy (especially after spending a winter on the runners of a dog sled), but our goal in learning to do anything is self-discovery. In workshop, we strive to discover the story’s intent, the story’s tools, and the story’s inner life. The better we learn to respond to other people’s stories, the better we will learn to discover our own.

I still haven’t won a dog race this season, but I have not lost a couple. As it turns out, not losing hasn’t been the reason for my obsession. My novel’s character hasn’t been the reason for my obsession either. I can’t honestly say why I’ve gotten obsessed. My best guess is that the same thing that led me to get consumed with running dogs is why I wrote about a girl who gets consumed with running dogs—it somehow reveals part of life’s mystery to us. The only thing I could do was write about this girl. The only thing I could do was get behind this team of dogs. The only thing I could do was tell the story and invite others to join me on its discovery. It is, after all, what every dog musher does when she stands on the runners behind the team that she has nurtured for months and years—aim them toward their mysterious possibility, pull the snow hook, and yell, “alright!”

With Poets in Winter: Online Discussion Sunday 2 to 5 pm AK time

Welcome! You're in the right place to ask questions from Peggy Shumaker, our Writer Laureate; Vivian Prescott, who divides her time between Sitka and Puerto Rico, and is founder of an organization called "Raven's Blanket" that is sponsoring a new poetry prize; Zack Rogow, who is not only a prolific poet, but also an award-winning translator; and Mike Burwell, who in addition to being a writer, teacher, and shipwreck researcher (!), is editor of the new literary journal "Cirque." Sandy Kleven, poet and filmmaker, is the discussion moderator.

To read the poems being discussed, click here.

To take part in the discussion here at the blog -- which takes place in the comments section --click on the "# comments" at the bottom of this post. You can use a Google account, which automatically posts your user picture, or you can choose the third option, where you simply type in your name, any name -- and note, you do not need to type in a URL. The anonymous option works, too. Questions? Email lax@alaska.net.

Ela: 49 Writers Weekly Round-up

Our first Crosscurrents Event, “Environmental Writing & Activism,” was a big success: stimulating conversation, 59 attendees, many books sold and new friends made. Thanks to our authors and co-sponsors. Audio content will be available as a web extra on the KSKA website soon; we’ll let you know when it’s up. The next Crosscurrents Event will be in April, so watch for it.

But of course, you don’t have to wait long for our next online literary event. Just show up here this Sunday from 2 to 5 pm for “With Poets in Winter,” an online discussion organized by Sandy Kleven and featuring poets Peggy Shumaker, Vivian Prescott, Zack Rogow, and Mike Burwell.

On February 2nd, noon to 1:30, and February 8, 5:30 to 7, in Anchorage, the Alaska State Council on the Arts (161 Klevin Street, in Mountain View) will be hosting a conversation about arts funding that is part of their 5-year strategic planning process. If you plan on attending, please rsvp to: christa.rayl@alaska.gov. They are having conversations elsewhere in Alaska as well. Check their website for full schedule [http://www.eed.state.ak.us/aksca/] And remember: if writers don’t speak up, we may continue to be underrepresented in general arts funding. Let state funders know you care about literary funding.

Just under three weeks until the Fiction Workshop course with Mattox Roesch and Deb Vanasse begins, and following that, we have a class about the Graphic Novel with Lee Post, and AK Screenwriting 101 with Don Rearden. Registration open now at www.49writingcenter.org. By the way, those latter two classes are open to ages 15 and up. Will you help us spread the word to talented teens about these new

opportunities?

Finally, please join us at the International Gallery of Contemporary Art for our First Friday book-signing, next Friday February 4th, 5.30-7.30pm, with Marybeth Holleman

If you're in Homer, tonight, Friday January 28 at 7pm, is another chance to hear Nancy Lord and Marybeth Holleman at the Kachemak Bay Campus of Kenai Peninsula College, Homer, in a reading and conversation moderated by historian Mike Hawfield about their environmental writing.

Join Anchorage Public Library for a book club open house to kick off the 5th annual Anchorage Reads. This year’s selection is the thought-provoking The Absolutely True Diary of a Part-time Indian by Sherman Alexie. Meet other book club members, exchange reading suggestions, success stories and dismal failures. Get tips for engaging members in stimulating book discussions. Sponsored by Target; co-hosted by Alaska Center for the Book.

Tuesday, Feb. 1, 5:30-7pm Z. J. Loussac Public Library, 3600 Denali Street, in the Ann Stevens Room, level 3

For more information:

Sherri Douglas

Anchorage Public Library

3600 Denali Street

Anchorage, AK 99503

(907)343-2840, (907)343-2820 – fax

douglasss@muni.org

On Sunday February 6th, 2.30-5pm, APU Liberal Studies presents Charles Wohlforth for a talk, Q&A and reception. Carr-Gottstein building, room 102.

See the new University of Alaska Press catalog, which includes our own Deb Vanasse's new title, Lucy’s Dance, as well as several other new books by Alaska authors, including Tom Sexton.

A collection of John Morgan's essays, "Forms of Feeling: Poetry in Our Lives" has been accepted for publication by Salmon Poetry, the Irish press that did "Spear-Fishing on the Chatanika." It should be out in about a year and has pieces that originally appeared in Manoa, Fourth Genre, The North American Review, and Writers' Chronicle, as well as several that were posted on 49writers.

The Island Institute's Resident Fellows Program provides opportunities for at least four writers to each spend a month in Sitka, Alaska, pursuing their own work and getting to know this unique island community in the forested coastal mountains of Southeast Alaska. Residents' time is largely their own to pursue their work, but each person is expected to take part in four community activities (more if desired). These include two public readings (one at the beginning and one at the end), a writing workshop, and a community discussion on a theme/topic of mutual interest to the writer, the Institute, and the community. Other activities might include talks to school or college classes and radio interviews.


The residency program aims to encourage the work of both promising and published writers who share the interests of The Island Institute--the nature of vital communities, the social and ethical web of human relationships and connections to the natural world, the global effort to shape sustainable human cultures.
The next application deadline is April 15, 2011 for positions in September, 2011 and January and April 2012. See their website for full details on how to apply.Each resident is provided living accommodations including a kitchen and a stipend of $75/week toward food costs. Travel to and from Sitka, as well as all other incidental costs, are the responsibility of the resident. Three positions are filled by application. There is a single application deadline of April 15 for positions in September of that year, and January and April of the following year. The November position each year is reserved for an international writer who comes to Sitka from the International Writing Program at the University of Iowa.

Holleman: On Jane Kenyon and Puppies

Thanks to January featured author Marybeth Holleman for this final guest-post.

Lately I’ve been puppy-sitting Ivy, a three-month old Siberian Husky-Labrador mix. God, is she cute, and God, is she crazy-wild. The only way to keep her from tearing up my houseplants and irritating my two older dogs is for my husband to walk all three dogs in the morning, for me to walk them in the afternoon, and for me to spend the rest of the time playing fetch, tug-of-war, and where’s-the-biscuit.

So, yeah, it’s affected my writing time. But, yeah, it’s worth it. No one knows better how to be in the present moment than a puppy. And when we’re out on the trail, the three dogs racing ahead of me, Ivy with that loopy puppy gait that’s as much about rolling along as running, my writing muse smiles. She knows I’m doing good work.

Two of my favorite poets, Mary Oliver and Jane Kenyon , are often walking with their dogs in their poems. They must have learned, as I have, that walking with a dog wakes you up even more to the present moment than does walking alone. Alone, your limbs can go on autopilot, and you can slip into thought, the mind anywhere but where you are. With dogs, that doesn’t happen, at least not for long, and never with a puppy.

I’ve written here before about the power of poetry. Poets in particular seem good at capturing the power of an everyday moment, what Virginia Woolf called “moments of being.” But as Woolf and others have said, it’s the primary job of every writer to pay proper attention. When we are in the present moment, and paying attention to the present moment, inspiration finds us. And it’s often the seemingly mundane moments of life that bring us the greatest treasures. As the philosopher Nietzche wrote, it is “…the least thing precisely, the gentlest thing, the lightest thing, a lizard’s rustling…” that makes up the best happiness. And the best writing.

Kenyon’s poems especially remind us of the power of these familiar moments. They are filled with the everyday, but they seem infused with such power we wonder what wizardry she’s up to. No wizardry, just skill in revealing what’s there all along. Take, for example, this poem:

The Clearing
The dog and I push through the ring
of dripping junipers
to enter the open space high on the hill
where I let him off the leash

... (click here to read the rest of the poem)

I recently read Donald Hall’s Without , a collection written during and after Kenyon’s illness and death. It sucks she left us so early, dying of cancer at the age of 47. What might she have written if given another 47 years, we’ll never know. But what she left behind! It was a short life, but one well-lived.

Lucky for us, besides all her poems, she left behind the guidelines she lived her writing life by, a list she gave in a lecture on writing. As you read them, you might just realize they’re exactly the kind of things you’d learn from walking with your dog. I have them posted near my desk, and I’ve shared them with every writing class I’ve taught. Read them attentively, as if you were sipping a fine wine or nibbling the finest chocolate. Or playing with a puppy.

Be a good steward of your gifts.
Protect your time.
Feed your inner life.
Avoid too much noise.
Read good books, have good sentences in your ears.
Be by yourself as often as you can.
Walk.
Take the phone off the hook.
Work regular hours.

Andromeda: Get ready for Sunday's online poetry discussion

I promised myself at the beginning of the month that I would try do something each January day to make the year feel truly new, and I've found that this "to-do" list has been more fun than my more sober and goal-oriented New Year's resolutions, which are filled with more "don'ts" than "dos." My "make it new" list combines serious and silly elements, everything from "buy myself flowers" to "sharpen a big pot of pencils" to "wear brighter colors" to "donate two more bags of clothes" to "read more poetry."

That last one is a perennial resolution of mine -- a small time commitment that I know would help me slow down and be more present in the world.

This morning, thanks to webmaster-savvy poet (and poetry organizer) Sandy Kleven, I had a chance to read some poems by Peggy Shumaker, Zack Rogow, and Vivian Prescott. Along with poet and editor Mike Burwell, these Alaskans will be both subjects and participants in the upcoming "With Poets in Winter" online discussion here, Sunday from 2 to 5 pm. This online event is a reprise of an invigorating poetry discussion last January.

Do you have a few minutes and a desire, in Ezra Pound's words, to "make it new"? Then check out the website in advance (clickable logo also at right) and read some of our Alaska poets. Return here Sunday to ask questions from Peggy, our Writer Laureate; Vivian, who divides her time between Sitka and Puerto Rico, and is founder of an organization called "Raven's Blanket" that is sponsoring a new poetry prize; Zack, who is not only a prolific poet, but also an award-winning translator; and Mike, who in addition to being a writer, teacher, and shipwreck researcher (!), is editor of the new literary journal "Cirque."

Not available Sunday? No problem. Leave your advance questions here at this post as comments and Sandy will help include them in the live online conversation. On Sunday, the conversation itself will be in the form of comments under a new posting.

(If you're confused about how to leave comments, now might be a good time to practice. To leave a comment, click on the "# comments" at the bottom of this post. You can use a Google account, which automatically posts your user picture, or you can choose the third option, where you simply type in your name, any name -- and note, you do not need to type in a URL. The anonymous option works, too. Questions? Email lax@alaska.net)

Thanks to all participants!

Stephanie Jaeger interviews Connie Huff, Alaska Professional Communicators

As part of our ongoing series of interviews with Alaska’s literary organizations, we bring you this interview with Connie Huff of Alaska Professional Communicators, with thanks to volunteer interviewer Stephanie Jaeger. 

Can you tell us about the history of APC?

Alaska Professional Communicators was originally called Alaska Press Women. Alaska Press Women was founded in Fairbanks in 1961 just two years after Alaska became a state. Pioneer Alaskan journalist Kay Kennedy believed a professional network would benefit women writers and journalists who were geographically scattered and often isolated from other professional women in the “last frontier” state.

While living in Seattle and working for the Alaska Visitors Bureau, she joined the Washington state affiliate of the National Federation of Press Women. The National Federation of Press Women is an organization of professional journalists and communicators. For more than 70 years, they have promoted the highest ethical standards while looking toward the future in professional development, networking and protecting our First Amendment rights. When she returned to Alaska, she promoted an Alaskan affiliate. The National Federation of Press Women required ten members to establish an affiliate charter. The charter was finally secured when 18 women qualified to become charter members. Creating a newsletter and establishing a communications contest were early orders of business.

March 27, 1964, the largest earthquake ever recorded in North America (9.2 on the Richter scale) jolted Alaska. Alaska Press Women members covered the devastation. Member Betzi Woodman, the Alaskan Reuters international correspondent, phoned the first eyewitness account to the lower 48.

In 2006, the Alaska Press Women voted to change its name to Alaska Professional Communicators to better demonstrate the diversity of its membership. Men and communicators outside of the press are welcomed.

Tell us about your membership—who, how many, and what benefits do they receive by joining APC?

Alaska Professional Communicators, a diverse group of some 70 members, has brought journalists, broadcasters, public relations specialists, photographers and other communicators together from throughout the state. We provide networking, friendship and professional education opportunities for the state’s professional communicators. Networking among members has resulted in friendships lasting 30 plus years. Professional networking and personal friendship have held our organization together for almost five decades. Each member is special to the whole. Most of the membership lives in Anchorage and activities are centered there.

On January 27, 2011, a Social Media Seminar will be held. All of our events and meetings are open to the public. Monthly luncheon meetings with speakers of interest are held the first Thursday of the month September through June.

Our objectives are to help members strive for excellence through dynamic seminars, exceptional networking opportunities and national publications with the hottest tips in the industry; recognize members’ achievements and their service through the nationally acclaimed Professional Communications Contest and the Communicator of Achievement Award at both the state and national level; support youth activities and education with emphasis on ethics and editorial rights and responsibilities under the First Amendment. The National Federation of Press Women holds the only nationwide high school writing contest. NFPW does not discriminate and welcomes minorities and male members.

To be eligible for active membership you must be currently engaged in communications service for remuneration, or the equivalent. Any full-time college or university student who intends to enter the communications field upon graduation may be eligible for student membership.

What awards and scholarships does APC offer? How are people nominated for these awards? How many receive these rewards and how are they chosen?

Betzi Woodman became an Alaska Press Women leader with extraordinary vision and energy. She mentored younger members, encouraging them to develop their leadership and organizational skills. When she expected them to run for office or to organize a workshop, they found they could do much more than they thought they could.

The Betzi Woodman Spark Plug Award is given to a member who inspired us throughout the year, displaying good organizational skills and motivating others to act on behalf of Alaska Professional Communicators. The 2010 recipient was Joan Harris, who has written and illustrated two books on Alaska’s birds and their rescue and treatment.

The Gold Nugget Award was created in the 1960s to recognize outstanding professional achievement. In 1993, it was renamed the Kay Kennedy Gold Nugget Award. The 2010 recipient was Sheila Balistreri for her professional and business accomplishments as a news broadcaster at KTUU Channel 2.

State Communicator of Achievement Awards are then entered for the prestigious national award. Four Alaskans have won the national award and six have placed in the finals. Competition is stiff for this award. Usually about 30 states submit nominees.

Two scholarships a year are awarded to Alaskan college students in a communications field. For details see http://www.akprocomm.org/scholarships.php

What else would you like our readers to know about APC?

Annual dues of $101 include the Alaska Professional Communicators and National Federation of Press Women dues and are some of the lowest of any professional organization. Members receive discounts for luncheon speaker meetings, seminars and communications contest.

In 2000 we hosted the National Communications Conference in Girdwood. We plan to host the 2015 National Federation of Press Women Conference in Anchorage.

On belief and nature writing: a guest post by Charles Wohlforth

Tomorrow night, Tuesday, Jan. 25 at 7 pm, we’re excited to present our first CROSSCURRENTS event: an onstage discussion, “Environmental Writing and Activism,” with Nancy Lord, Marybeth Holleman, and Charles Wohlforth, at Out North Theater. Our thanks to Cook Inletkeeper, the Alaska Center for the Environment, and the Prince William Sound Science Center for co-sponsoring this event. UAA Bookstore will handle book sales for the signing that follows. Here, moderator Charles Wohlforth offers a preview of the intriguing questions the session will address. Help us spread the word about this exciting event!

Writing about Alaska presents many of the same challenges as writing about religion or faith. For those who seek to persuade readers to adopt their point of view about conservation, negotiating that challenge is an essential problem. I'm looking forward to my on-stage interview January 25 with two of Alaska's best writers, Nancy Lord and Marybeth Holleman, to talk about how they address the opportunities and challenges of their favorite subject. The program begins at 7 p.m. at Out North Theater, 3800 DeBarr Road.

Like spirituality, the love of Alaska offers a promising subject for a writer: vast, complex, enigmatic and intrinsically interesting to most of us. The experience of the outdoors can be intensely personal, and so creates an opportunity for intimacy with a reader. On the other hand, nothing can provoke eye-rolling more readily than bad nature writing or overwrought spiritual expressions. Writing that is too personal and not connected sufficiently to the objective experience of readers can easily be passed off as pretty but irrelevant.

Holleman and Lord's recent books take radically different approaches to this problem. At our forum, Lord will read briefly from Early Warming and Holleman from The Heart of the Sound, so you'll have a chance to hear that difference for yourself.

Being relevant matters when we're concerned about issues like climate change and oil pollution, as in these books. We need to inspire readers, connect with them on a deep level, and provoke them to act in the political realm. Here is where Alaska stops being a religion. Religious truths command only those who adhere to a shared belief system. In order to make major social changes in attitude toward the environment, writers must reach across belief systems to find a shared obligation to the Earth.

At the intersection of the personal and the political, these Alaskan writers have taken on the most important and most difficult task facing society. In this common space where our actions affect every living thing, we're groping for magic words that will motivate our friends, neighbors and adversaries to take responsibility individually and collectively for a world in decline.

Writers are not heroes. Most of us write because we feel, in some way, compelled to do so. But writers are worth listening to, because the act of translating the world to the page requires a lot of thought and emotional exploration. I'm looking forward to learning how Lord and Holleman addressed that process on the 25th.

If you have a question or question you'd like addressed by the authors at Tuesday's Crosscurrents event, please leave it below. We'll gather audience questions here and at the gathering to be addressed by the authors.

Ela: 49 Writers Weekly Round-up

49 Writers is spreading its wings beyond the Anchorage area! Last Tuesday's 'Resolve To Write' event in Homer, co-ordinated by Miranda Weiss, had a great attendance of around 15. Writers of all stripes connected over burger and brew at Alice's Champagne Palace, received an insider preview and some background stories about Nancy Lord's new book, Early Warming, shared writerly resolutions (and vegetable-eating intentions too), and generally enjoyed a good time, with the promise of more to come.

Last-minute chance to register for the “Stirring Words” food writing class with Kirsten Dixon that begins tomorrow (Saturday). It’s time also to encourage you to consider taking “A Fiction Workshop” with Mattox Roesch and Deb Vanasse, starting Thursday February 17. This latter class is one of our meatiest offerings of the term: a full eight weeks, team-taught by two published authors, organized in the traditional workshop format with opportunities for critique as well as discussion of published works. Register now and you’ll have a full four weeks to prepare your short story or 20-page novel excerpt for workshopping. (Deadlines can be so very helpful.)

On Tuesday, January 25th, we look forward to seeing you at the opening event in our new CROSSCURRENT series. Come hear Nancy Lord, Marybeth Holleman, and moderator Charles Wohlforth discuss “Environmental Writing & Activism” at Out North Theatre at 7 pm. We’re currently planning other events in this series, and would love to hear your ideas. Is there a literary conversation about a particular theme or involving a specific Alaska author that you’d love to hear in this format? Let us know. Nancy Lord and Marybeth Holleman are undertaking quite the tour over the next week: see below for other opportunities to hear them.

On Saturday, January 22, at 4:00pm,there will be a book-signing with Nancy Lord, author of Early Warming: Crisis and Response in the Climate-Changed North and Mary Beth Holleman author of Heart of the Sound. Gulliver's Books, 3525 College Road, Fairbanks, AK

Then, on  Sunday, January 23 at noon, at the Fairbanks Unitarian Universalist after-service program, Nancy Lord and Marybeth Holleman will be presenting some of their environmental writing in a conversation moderated by Robert Hannon.

On Monday, January 24 at 7pm, as part of the Northern Voices series sponsored by Northern Alaska Environmental Center, Wien Memorial Library, Fairbanks; Nancy Lord and Marybeth Holleman will read, show some slides, and answer questions about environmental writing.

On Tuesday, January 25 at 10 a.m., Nancy Lord and Marybeth Holleman will be the guests on Talk of Alaska, the statewide call-in radio show hosted by Steve Heimel. Please call them! And it's later that same day, at 7pm at Out North Theater in Anchorage, that the Crosscurrents event mentioned above takes place.

On Tuesday, January 25 at 7:00pm, at Barnes & Noble, 200 East Northern Lights Blvd, Anchorage, AK, join Anchor Park Reading Group for a discussion of this month's selected book, Run With the Horses: The Quest for Life at Its Best, by Eugene Peterson. 

On Wednesday, January 26, at 4:00pm, 2011 AEDC Economic Forecast guest speaker Peter Sheahan will present an informal lecture. Peter’s fifth book FL!P, an international best-seller available in 25 countries, emphasizes the need for leaders to have mindset flexibility. UAA Rasmuson Hall, 3416 Seawolf Drive, Anchorage, AK

On Wednesday, Jan 26, 6:00pm, there will be Open Mic at the UAA Student Union Den, 2921 Spirit Way, Anchorage, AK Poetry, song, dance and comedy are all welcome.

On Friday January 28 at 7pm, at the Kachemak Bay Campus of Kenai Peninsula College, Homer, Nancy Lord and Marybeth Holleman will feature in a reading and conversation moderated by historian Mike Hawfield, about their environmental writing.

See Nancy's website for information about further readings 'outside,' in Seattle and at the AWP in Washington.

The Fairbanks Drama Association and The Looking Glass Group Theatre invite Alaskan residents to send in their best 10-minute plays to be considered for the 10th Annual 8X10 Festival of New Alaskan Plays. Eight ten-minute plays will be given rehearsed staged readings at the Festival, which will be held April 15 & 16, 2011, at FDA’s Riverfront Theater in Fairbanks. One entry per playwright (AK residents only); one author per play. No musicals or children's plays. Entrants should submit five copies of their script, typed and bound, with pages numbered. Cover page with playwright’s name and contact info, including

phone and e-mail (on cover page only). “Cast of Characters” page with brief character descriptions following cover page. (These pages not included in page count.)

Cast size should be no more than eight actors.

Plays should be between 8 & 12 minutes long based on one minute of playing time per page of script, 12 pt. font size, standard playwriting format. 

No electronic submissions or Express mail. Scripts will not be returned.

Submissions must be postmarked no later than March 15, 2011 and sent to:

8X10 Festival

Fairbanks Drama Association/ Looking Glass Group Theatre

1852 Second Avenue

Fairbanks, Alaska 99701

For more information, contact:

Peggy MacDonald Ferguson, Executive Director

Fairbanks Drama Association

907-456-PLAY

pegferguson@gci.net

Next Month's Poetry Parley is looking for readers! On Wednesday, February 16th, the Parley will be featuring the works of Nikki Giovanni in honor of Black History Month. If you're interested and available, send email to Jonathan Minton as soon as possible and let me know what poems you'd like to read,

The second North Words Writers Symposium will be held in Skagway on June 1-4, 2011. There’s a great faculty lining up already. They have just announced  that Howard Blum of New York will be the keynote speaker. Random House is releasing his new book, The Floor of Heaven, about the Yukon Gold Rush a month prior to the conference. They also have commitments from Heather Lende, John Straley, Peggy Shumaker, Kim Heacox, Tim Woody and our own Deb Vanasse, along with the usual suspects Buckwheat, Jeff Brady and Dan Henry.

Readers of this blog got the news in advance about Andromeda Romano-Lax’s sale of her second novel last November. Last week, Publishers Weekly made it official, selecting the Discus Thrower sale to Soho Press as one of its top six “deals of the week,” under the headline, “Soho Grabs the ‘Discus."

Check out the Seattle Times Newspaper for a great review of David Vann's Caribou Island. 

Don Rearden's Raven’s Gift has arrived at the UAA Campus Bookstore. It was hard to order, from Canada, so it's great to have it available. Mark your calendars for a UAA Campus Bookstore event with Don: Monday February 28 from 5:00pm- 7:00pm. 

For an exciting intro to the book see  http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JAhtf_D3qdE&feature=related Don Rearden teaches at College of Preparatory and Developmental Studies/UAA and is on the 49 Writers board.

Homer storyteller Bill Noomah is undertaking a year long project to read and write a poem a day. Read about this undertaking and monitor his progress at: http://noomah365.blogspot.com/
This last week Bill posted his 49th poem and decided it was time to share with the 49 Writers community.

Holleman: What are (environmental) writers for?

I have been trying to imagine thousands of red-winged blackbirds falling from the sky, dead, lying on the ground all around me. How must it have felt, to see that, to stand in a field of dead red-winged blackbirds?

And what does it mean? We don’t even know what caused their deaths. Fireworks? Maybe. But there have been fireworks for decades. Maybe fireworks were the last straw. Maybe it was an accumulation of things: habitat destruction and fragmentation, strange weather events caused by global warming, contamination from our use of oil—in the air, the water, in what they eat. Maybe it’s even connected to the Gulf oil spill. We just don’t know.

But it happened, and as an environmental writer, I sit and think about it, imagine what it looked like, and wonder what it means. This is what I do. Does it do any good?

Scientists are no doubt investigating this as well, as they do. But as a writer I get to ask different questions. I can make different leaps. I can use my imagination. Take for example what Tom Wolfe does in The Right Stuff. This is a book of nonfiction that explores the inner world of early astronauts. Wolfe immersed himself so deeply into his research, into his subject matter, that he recreates scenes in incredible detail. Scenes that he was not there to witness. There’s even a scene where we’re hearing John Glenn’s thoughts. That’s pretty cool. And damn effective.

Of course, this writer’s leap comes with a heavy responsibility—to readers and to the subject matter. And environmental writers take on responsibility as well for their non-human subjects. Which can get tricky, and has all sorts of pitfalls like the dreaded anthropomorphism. The solution, again, is immersion.

As to whether it does any good. The million dollar question.

Writing about the natural world has been instrumental in how human society regards the other life with which we share our home planet. Think Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring. But we’re facing big hurdles now, with this thing called climate change. Unlike the problem Carson described, we can’t fix it in a couple of decades by not using DDT or even by not using oil anymore.

What can we do? How do we tell the increasingly desperate and dismal stories of environmental issues in a way that people will read? How do we get beyond speaking to the choir? Come join our discussion, “Environmental Writing and Activism,” on Tuesday night at 7 pm at Out North Theatre. Let's find some answers.

As to the title: it comes from Wendell Berry’s collection of essays entitled What Are People For?.

I placed the word “environmental” in parentheses because I think it doesn’t matter what your subject matter is, we writers all share the same basic obligations. And I think all people share the same basic obligations as well. To be of use, to leave the world a better place because you were here. So you can change “writer” back to “people” and get the same answer. That’s what Wendell Berry would say.

Our January featured guest-blogger Marybeth Holleman is author of The Heart of the Sound: An Alaskan Paradise Found and Nearly Lost, and co-editor with Anne Coray of Crosscurrents North: Alaskans on the Environment. She'll be discussing the topic of environmental writing and activism with author Nancy Lord and moderator Charles Wohlforth at a 49 Alaska Writing Center CROSSCURRENTS event at Out North Theatre on Jan. 25 at 7 pm.

Chiappone: The Accidental Writing Retreat

Thanks to Rich Chiappone for this guest-post.

My friend Nancy Lord has long considered herself the Queen of All Writing Retreats, and for good reason. Although I don’t have the actual number right here in front of me, I believe that Nancy has enjoyed the hospitality of various writers’ colonies, enclaves and hideaways in all fifty states, a few American protectorates, several former Soviet Bloc satellites, and a number of places I cannot find on any map of the world or globe: she has attended a little under twelve thousand of them in all, I think. Her partner, Ken has not actually seen her since about 1986.

OK, all clowning aside, anyone who knows me knows that I would not poke this kind of ridiculous fun at Nancy if I were not as fond of her as I am. She is one of our most accomplished and respected writers and a former Alaska Laureate, and she really will tell anyone who’ll listen that writing retreats have helped her get there (note from editor: follow this link for Nancy's 2009 post with many retreat and residency options).

Nancy is also known for her kindness to other writers. For several years she has encouraged me to apply to her favorite writer’s retreat centers (perhaps in recognition of my dismal output, or merely just to stop my whining about it). She has sent me their information, links to their application forms, even offered to put in a good word. Guys like me need all the good words we can get. Yet, I never pursued it. Now, suddenly, I wish I had.

I didn’t need to go to a retreat, I reasoned. I’ve already retired from my business and now live in a house in the woods at the end of a little dirt road at Anchor Point. How much farther does a writer need to retreat from life in order to write, I asked.

My wife, Lin, goes off to work every morning to Homer High School, fifteen miles south; our cats go back to bed. My only neighbor drives away in his gravel truck soon after. I have the whole house, the whole little dirt road, acres of unpopulated woods to myself ---in which to write, it could be expected.

But I almost never do. You know, write.

Oh, I get a story or two out each year, a few pieces published here and there. But not many. There are numerous days, even weeks, that I do not open a document file or touch a pen to the many yellow pads, shuffled among the piles of papers and books in my office, waiting to be written upon.

Inside my little office, distractions are minimal, aside from the one cat who has figured out that if he walks back and forth across my keyboard, I will eventually give up and turn my energies to guessing what he wants. Likewise there is not a lot to look at in the dense spruce forest a few yards outside my office windows either, except for a lot of bird activity. But I am a very amateur birder at best, and not driven to study every sunflower seed the nuthatch crams into the spruce bark, nor every wingy skirmish that erupts among the bellicose little pine siskins.

I don’t listen to the radio, ever, except when I’m driving in my truck. We haven’t had TV reception since the early eighties. The phone rarely rings. The U. S. Postal Service does not deliver to our door, and neither does the Anchorage Daily News, meaning I have neither mailman nor delivery boy to chat with. Even the Jehovah’s Witnesses have not yet discovered us. I’m alone. A lot. Why would I need to travel to a distant state to “get away from it all?”

And yet, in spite of my resistance to growth, I somehow manage to learn new things now and then.

In mid-December, I flew to Phoenix, AZ, where I remain today, exactly one month later. It’s been the most productive writing month of my life. Lin and I own a very small brick home here in north central Phoenix, the house Lin lived in when she was a student in high school: two bedrooms and a bathroom the size of a cat box. Here, I once again find myself alone all day and most nights, only this time in a big strange city. It has become my writer’s retreat.

I think that after 35 years of shutting the door behind me each morning and driving off to work elsewhere, I never really accepted the idea of “working at home.” It still sounds inherently oxymoronic, like hobby farming, say, or war games. I read somewhere that a best selling author (Jane Hamilton, maybe) rented a storefront space in a strip mall a few miles from her house where she went to write her novel every day. She had her own house to herself, but couldn’t get any work done there; writing didn’t feel like a productive activity unless she had to drive to her desk to do it. Now I understand.

Wait. Let me just say it for you: Who cares how anyone else writes, or fails to write?

Good point. I know what you mean. Believe me, at the end of many a gloomy unproductive day, when bedtime rolled around and I once again faced the fact that I had not written a word since climbing out of that bed that morning, I reminded myself that no one on this planet cares. No one anywhere suffers if I, or any of us, never write another thing again. Nobody. Period. The world needs another short story, another poem, another novel, like another hole in the ozone layer. There is so much competition for space in the magazines and on the bookstore shelves now, writers peck and claw each other for every opening like siskins on sunflower seeds. Magazine editors are drowning under rising seas of unsolicited manuscripts; giant bookstores bloat with unloved titles, marked down to pennies on the dollar. Who, exactly, needs us to write more books?

But I also know that we writers want to talk about that, and about everything else there is to say regarding this crazy, stupid, frustrating, sometimes horribly depressing thing we all love to do. And that’s why I’d like to shamelessly report that, after writing every single day for almost a month, one recent evening, alone in my Phoenix, Arizona bed, I rolled over onto my side, tugged the covers up onto my ear and discovered that, in spite of the loneliness you’d expect, I felt strangely happy. “This must be what it means to be a real writer,” I thought, smugly. However vacuous and self-congratulatory that may sound, it was a big moment for me.

That said, I must admit I never thought much of writers who seemed to want credit for having put their keisters in a chair and poked a keyboard every single day of their lives since kindergarten or some such thing. It did not sound like much of an accomplishment, or much of a life for that matter. I was a fool. Last summer at the Kachemak Bay Writer’s Conference one of our guest writers, Bill Roorbach said that in order to get serious and write every day, he had to hear himself decline a social invitation from a friend, responding, “I can’t come. I have to work.” I listened to Bill say that and wondered if I could ever utter those words.

I haven’t gotten there yet. But I’m working on it.

P.S. For anyone had the opportunity to meet and enjoy the good humor and charm of the really hardworking Bill Roorbach last summer in Homer, I want to report that Bill is recovering from neck surgery. He was operated on Monday of last week and is doing well. Please send him your best wishes at the “Dave and Bill’s Cocktail Hour” website.


Rich Chiappone's latest book is Opening Days, a collection of essays, stories and poems.

Deb, Therese, and Debbie: Resolve to Write report

In grand style, our first 49 Writers events of 2011 kicked off in Juneau and Anchorage on Friday night, with Resolve to Write gatherings in Anchorage and Juneau.  In Juneau, Therese Harvey and Grace Elliott hosted.  Therese reports an even dozen in attendance at the Rookery on a freezing cold Juneau night. She adds, "Among us were working writers, beginning writers, writers switching genres: a couple of scientists, a horror movie screenwriter, a songwriter, a storyteller, a novelist, two journalists, a wood carver, a science fiction writer, and a couple of journal writers looking to expand their writing outside of the nightly journal.

"Many of us were meeting for the first time," Therese notes. "Most of us had been writing for some time and were expanding the formats in which we would write. We discussed our resolutions and talked generally of all things related to writing.  All present are interested in meeting again. We have an email list for each other and we will meet again to talk about progress with our resolutions, hold feet to the fire for those who wish it, and generally enjoy the company of our fellow writers.  A good time was had by all."

Our thanks to Therese and Grace as well as all who attended in Juneau.
 
 

 

 
In Anchorage, we met at the marvelous Moderow home for a wonderful potluck, with informal eating and chatting until about 7:45. The program, featuring Bill Streever, Don Reardon, Kent Sturgis, ended around nine p.m.  Thirty members and volunteers showed up with tasty comfort food and plenty of wine.  We were also happy to welcome from Kotzebue Susan Andrews and John Creed, who spoke about how they enjoyed publishing with Epicenter, as well as Steve Quinn, who showed off some lovely books from Chin Music Press in Seattle.  Nancy Lord also stopped in on her way back to Homer, where she has promised to also attend our Resolve to Write Homer event on Tuesday, Jan. 18 at 6 p.m., upstairs at Alice's

 
For more 49 Writers fun, make sure to mark your calendar for Crosscurrents: Environmental Writing, featuring Nancy Lord and Marybeth Holleman in an onstage conversation moderated by Charles Wohlforth:  Tuesday, Jan. 25, at Outnorth Theater on DeBarr Road.

Deb's DIYMFA: The List

Last week I blogged about my DIY (Do It Yourself) MFA program, a self-propelled effort to ramp up by writing with a commitment to excellence in reading and craft.  A few of you kindly asked about my reading list and suggested you might like to read along, which would be an awesome arrangement, like an informal DIYMFA cohort.

There's nothing magical about my reading list, of course.  It's a quirky reflection of my eclectic tastes, except for those books that Jayne Anne Phillips and David Vann use in their workshops.  And my annotations last year were less than stellar - I mostly scribbled notes in the pages of the books.  But this is a new year, and I'd love to be more resolute in the recordkeeping for this part of my life.

To keep it simple, I've add a sidebar link (scroll WAY to the bottom of the blog) to Deb's DIYMFA reading group, which I set up on Goodreads. This isn't an official 49 Writers venture, but for initial identification I had Corvex McCarthy stand watch - that logo's set up to change to the book stack at the top of this post.  Clicking through, you'll can surf the bookshelves to see what I read last year, what I'm currently reading, and what's on my to-read list.

There's only one member in my little discussion group so far, and that's me, but if you'd like to join, you're most welcome, and of course there's no obligation to read or take part if you do join.  If others want to read along with me, I'll open discussions as I finish each book.  (No worries and no spoilers if you're not done with the book yet.)  I'd love for you to add titles from your current reading list to the mix; maybe I'll swap some of my choices for yours.  "Real" MFAers, I'd love to see your favorites, too, either posted at Goodreads or in the comments below.

If I stay a one-person group (hmmm...not grammatically possible, but online we can be whatever we want, right?), I still plan to annotate as I work through my list.  If nothing else, you all have made me more accountable to myself, and I can always use more of that.

Ela: 49 Writers Weekly Round-up

Please tell your literary/foodie friends about our next-up class: Stirring Words with Kirsten Dixon, starting Jan. 22. Registration for all of our classes is open now.

49 Writers members and volunteers are invited to an Anchorage potluck gathering to share their writing resolutions for 2011 and to visit with writers Don Rearden and Bill Streever about their own resolutions, successes, and challenges. Kent Sturgis from Epicenter Press will also be on hand to chat with guests about editing and trade publishing. Bring comfort food to share (consolations for our 2010 shortcomings) and your own beverage. January 14 from 6:30-8:00pm at the Moderow home: Take Abbott past Service High toward Hilltop Ski Area, right on Homestead, immediate left on Grover, go up one hill and partway up the next, look for Raven Place sign on the right. Call 907-388-9303 or 360-0727 if you need help. RSVP's would be greatly appreciated, to debbie.moderow@gmail.com.

Another of our Resolve to Write salon-style gatherings kicks off tonight too, in Juneau. Join Therese Harvey and Grace Elliott on Jan. 14th from 6:30 - 7:30 pm at the Rookery Cafe at 111 Seward St. (Only the Anchorage event is restricted to members and volunteers.) And if you're in Homer, join Miranda Weiss, Nancy Lord, and other local writers on Tuesday, January 18, 6-7:30ish pm, upstairs at Alice's.

Tuesday, Jan. 25 at 7 pm we’ll be presenting our first new CROSSCURRENTS event: an onstage discussion, “Environmental Writing and Activism,” with Nancy Lord, Marybeth Holleman, and Charles Wohlforth, at Out North Theater. This event is co-sponsored by Cook Inletkeeper and the Alaska Center for the Environment.

Can’t bear to leave the house during this cold spell? Well, okay. For you, we have the upcoming Poets in Winter online discussion, from 2 to 5 pm on Sunday, Jan. 30, moderated by poet and filmmaker Sandy Kleven. More details and a special event website coming soon; mark your calendars now. Last year’s January poetry discussion had an amazing 146 comments. Might be fun to skim in advance of this next online conversation.

LITERARY AWARDS PROGRAM DEADLINE NEARS
Nominations for the 2010 Contributions to Literacy in Alaska (CLIA) Awards are due this Saturday, January 15th. The annual statewide awards, sponsored by Alaska Center for the Book, recognize people and institutions who have made a significant contribution in literacy, the literary arts, or the preservation of the written or spoken word in Alaska. Previous winners include librarians, teachers, writers, tutors, historians, booksellers, reading programs, web sites and others dedicated to making the world a better place through the gift of language. The one-page nomination form and information on past winners is available at www.alaskacenterforthebook.org.

Alaskan crime writer Dana Stabenow will be on KAKM/KSKA Public Broadcasting Stations TV for interview on Saturday January 15th). More information here.

The Alaska Writers Guild's Monthly Meeting will take place on Tuesday, January 18, 7 p.m. at the Wilda Marston Theater at the Loussac Library The speaker will be Michael Catoggio, Longtime Local Librarian, on The History of E-Books: Pros and Cons, Ways and Means of eBook Publication.

January's Poetry Parley takes place on Wednesday, January 19, at 7:00pm. Out North, 3800 DeBarr Road, Anchorage, AK 99508-2011. Featured poet for January 2011: Baudelaire, and featured local poet: Susanna Mishler. Poetry Parley is a free poetry event held on the third Wednesday of each month. A different well-known poet is celebrated each month, as well as a local poet who reads his or her own original work. If you are interested in being a reader for Poetry Parley, or if you would like to submit your own work for possible inclusion, please email poetryparley@gmail.com.

On Thursday, January 27, 2011, there will be a Social Media Seminar with Sherrie Simmonds and Aliza Sherman from the AK Professional Communicators Association It will take place at Elim Café, 561 West Dimond Boulevard (Dimond and Arctic), Anchorage.
12–1 p.m. – Lunch and networking.
1–4 p.m. – Seminar
January 19 – Deadline for registration via PayPal: $50 members, $75 non-members
Late registration and/or payment at the door: $60 members, $85 non-members (More detailed information soon at http://www.akprocom.org.

Coming up at the UAA Bookstore this month: on Tuesday January 25 from 5:00pm-7:00pm, Alaskan Author Sean Schubert presents his book, Infection. Sean Schubert takes us through the streets of Anchorage wondering if anyone will survive the onslaught of zombies.

The eighth (free!) Dear Lucky Agent contest offered through the Guide to Literary Agents is open through January 23. Writers with unpublished, book-length manuscripts in the category of literary fiction are invited to send the first 150-200 words of their work. The top three winners all get: 1) A critique of the first ten pages of their work by agent judge Lindsey Clemons at Larsen-Pomada Literary Agents in San Francisco, and 2) A free one-year subscription to WritersMarket.com

On Thursday January 27 from 5:00pm-7:00pm, Randol Bruns and Mike Burwell present Chulitna: A Conversation in Poems. Bruns and Burwell (Cartography of Water, editor of Cirque), collaborated on this beautiful book of poetry and art. For further information about Chulitna see http://www.magcloud.com/browse/issue/140882

And on Monday January 31 from 5:00pm-7:00pm, Mary Alice Cook discusses “An Intentional Community”: An Orthodox Christian Church in Eagle River and her book Community of Grace: An Orthodox Christian Year in Alaska. After their marriage in 1976, Mary Alice and her husband drove from Texas to Anchorage where their three sons were born and raised. In 1992, after a life-changing event, the whole family converted to the Eastern Orthodox Church and a year later decided to make their home near St. John’s Cathedral in Eagle River, which is the unique “intentional community” that Mary Alice has written about in Community of Grace.

Sarah Gonzales, producer of Kids These Days! on KSKA, reports that she is always looking for more contributors, and 2011 has a wealth of show topics lined up on: Foster Care, Love and Family Relations, The Value of Music Education, Choosing the Right School, The Man Show (modern fatherhood), and the Part-Time Single Parent (Alaskan spouses who care for the kids while the other spouse works on the slope, fishing, mining, etc). If these topics inspire you, they'd love to hear. Also, they are always looking for more guest bloggers. cell: 907-315-0006, show: 888-KTD-RADIO

Rasmuson Foundation continues its commitment to Alaskan artists by offering grants to artists of all disciplines and career stages. If you have not received an Individual Artist Award from Rasmuson Foundation in the last three years, then you may eligible to apply for one of three awards.

Project Awards of up to $5,000 will be awarded to support short-term projects that have a clear benefit to the artist and development of their work. Fellowship Awards of $12,000 are available to mid-career and mature artists working in choreography, folk/traditional arts, crafts, literary arts/scriptworks or performance art. One distinguished artist award of $25,000 will be given to a mature Alaska artist.

First, starting January 17, artists will be able to apply online at http://www.rasmuson.org/. Online applications must be filed by 11:59 p.m. on March 1. Paper applications will still be accepted, and the postmark deadline is March 1.

Second, Presentation/Interpretation has been added as an eligible artistic discipline for artists who make use of existing work for the purpose of presentation or performance. This expands eligibility to dancers, actors, musicians, vocalists and others who are primarily performing artists.

Want to learn more about the grant application process, or ask questions about how you can improve a past grant application that did not receiving funding? Join us for one of three, free informational teleconferences. The teleconferences will be organized by artistic discipline:

Jan. 18, 2011 (6 – 7 p.m.): Literary Arts, Scriptworks and Music Composition
Jan 19, 2011 (6 – 7 p.m.): Performance Art, Multi-Discipline, Choreography, Media Arts, Presentation/Interpretation
Jan 20, 2011 (6 – 7 p.m.): Visual Arts, Crafts, Folk/Traditional
The teleconference coordinates will be the same on each night:
Number: 1 (877) 615-4339, Passcode: 6117 516#

Guidelines and application materials are available here, answers to frequently asked questions can be found here, a list of past award-winners can be found here. For more information, please contact Jayson Smart at (907) 297-2882.

Lori Evans, editor and publisher of the Homer News, writes to say that thanks to 49 Writers, they have all the judges they need for the Kenai Peninsula Writers Contest. Lori says she can't thank enough those who volunteered; the response to our member email was immediate. The volunteers are very much appreciated... and there will be another contest next year!

Andromeda: The problem with faulty metaphors -- on avalanches and editing

Two weeks ago precisely, I mentioned that I was busy getting my husband and 12-year-old daughter out the door for a winter camping trip -- one they were doing for school-related reasons. (In other words, this was not my husband's idea of fun, nor was the timing ideal.)

Blogging is not like methodical essay-writing. Hurrying on a busy bloggy morning, one often reaches for the quick conclusion or the facile metaphor, and ends up with something lame like this:

...to be fair, one of the pleasures of winter camping, I've been told, is that once you're all properly set up, in your bag/tent or snow shelter, you're not all that cold. One's imagination of what it will be like is worse than reality. ... And isn't that how so many aspects of the writing life are as well? You moan and groan about getting started, stalling in every way possible, but once your mind makes a connection with the story, you're rolling. It's actually pretty warm and comfortable inside that story, novel, or memoir you're creating.

You can probably see where this is going.

No, winter camping was not comfortable for my husband and daughter, nor was it easy. And in that sense, perhaps it was a good metaphor for writing, though not the one I had glibly intended.

Two weeks ago, we'd just broken out of a cold snap and the day in question had dawned surprisingly warm, maybe 20 degrees or so, but with a stiff wind. (I do not trust winds.) The radio announced -- then cancelled -- a high-wind advisory. I mentioned this to my husband and our friend, an experienced mountaineer, and they insisted it was a warm wind. Pleasant even. When I dropped them at the trailhead with their sleds and their snowshoes, this wind was blowing quite fiercely. By evening, it was a "pleasant, warm," 60 mile-per-hour wind.

Still, the stoic foursome (two men, two daughters) had some fun building their snow shelter in a broad, empty valley; and erecting their tent next to it, in a somewhat protected spot that seemed to be collecting the swirling snow at a considerable rate; and eating their Hamburger Helper inside the tent.

All good, until our very good mountaineer friend, who has twice summited Denali and nearly lost his life years ago during a winter trip on South America's highest peak Mt. Aconcagua -- and who did, in fact lose a few fingers on that trip -- noticed that really quite a lot of snow was burying the tent. He went outside and started to dig, remembering (a little too clearly) how this familiar situation turned out last time. A little valley in suburban Anchorage is not Aconcagua, but still. There were two young girls along for the trip next time -- two young girls who are quite fond of their fingers and hope to have them for several more years.

Soon after, a very small (very small!) bluff near the tent let loose its snow load. Down came that heavy, wet stuff, crushing the shelter (luckily, no one inside) and pushing the bulging, collapsed shelter into one side of the already-snow-burdened tent (everyone out, packing quickly, searching for the extra warm layers of clothing that were hard to locate at that exciting moment). The tent was recoverable-- just barely -- ripping as it was pulled free from the weight of the fallen snow. Outside in the dark, the blizzard was blowing so fiercely that it was hard for the group to see anything at all.

The foursome snowshoed the two miles to safety, with a little story to tell, and spouses (this one anyway) a little keyed up with questions both geographical and semantic, for example: "Was that really the right place to camp?" And: "If it's just a small snow-slide (snow slough?) can we call it something other than an avalanche, so we don't freak out my mother-in-law?"

It's taking me a while to bring this back to the subject of writing, but back I go now, with the anxiety of that two-week-old adventure now fading in my mind, having faded already in the minds of my daughter and husband, who continue to insist the trip wasn't such a big deal, just a nuisance (perhaps an instructive one, I'm still hoping).

Since their healthy return, I've been trying to find time to finish editing a novel, and I keep remembering how I claimed in this blog that it was not so hard -- actually cozy once you got "rolling."

Well: hogwash. I mean sure, there are flashes of ease, but it's often a slog. Even the smallest tasks, like editing a hundred pages or so from present tense into past tense (my current aim) takes a long time. Even simply re-reading a long work takes many hours -- days in fact -- and when you're like me, and re-read a novel draft no fewer than a dozen times through revisions, that's a slog. It's terribly hard to know whether sections are too dull for the reader when you've read them so many times yourself. After the fourth or seventh read, every draft seems dull.

This week, I started worrying about my own revision process, and envying those writers who (supposedly) labor hard on every sentence but then end up with a draft that is basically complete the first time around. While fretting about this, I heard an interview with poet Billy Collins in which he described two kinds of drafters -- the no-revision and the major-revision type -- and he compared them to cooking styles. There are people who clean every dish as they cook, and people who leave a big messy pile of pots and pans at the end. I'm the latter kind. So is Billy Collins. That makes me feel a little better at least.

I end this blogpost with an apology, or at least a modest retraction: Winter camping isn't easy. Writing and editing aren't easy. Avalanches -- and messes -- happen. And multiple drafts, like a midnight snowshoe through a wind-tunnel of a valley, are tough. But you handle them the way you handle everything: one step at a time. That's all I know for sure today; retractions, perhaps, on another day. Now back to work.

Holleman: One Nation, Divisible Under Rhetoric

Yesterday I was shopping for furniture wax, but the only one I found sounded too dangerous: not only was it combustible, but the fumes could lead to permanent brain damage. Then I got home and learned about the Arizona shooting.

It gave me pause. Especially as a writer. It reminded me that the tool of my trade, language, is also highly combustible and can cause brain damage. No doubt the man who opened fire on Representative Giffords already had problems, but it’s important to take a very hard look at how language fed his derangement and fueled such an act.

Increasingly, language is used as a weapon to incite violence and hatred and division. Last week I went to a medical clinic near where I live. At one end of the waiting room was a stand with political pamphlets and a sign saying that the clinic existed because of God and our founding fathers, but the views expressed were those of the owners. The owners, however, are two of the three clinic doctors.

At the receptionist counter was a diagram of our new health care system, showing a maze that no one in their right minds could follow.

“Is this a joke?” I asked the receptionist.

“No, I’m afraid it’s not,”she replied, her face still as stone.

Later, this receptionist engaged in derisive banter with another patient about “Obamacare” loud enough for everyone in the waiting room to hear.

Regardless of whether I agree with the political and religious views of the clinic owners, I was more than a little uneasy about having their views imposed upon me as a patient. It made the clinic extremely hostile; such hostile environments are sprouting up all over, and it’s language that’s used to create them.

Yes, we all want to uphold our rights to free speech. But at least six people, including a nine-year-old girl, lost their lives in the Arizona shooting, so it only makes sense that we take a step back and listen to Pima County Sherrif Clarence Dupnik, who suggested that those exercising their right to free speech consider the effects:

"’When you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain mouths about tearing down the government. The anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous,’ said Sheriff Dupnik. ‘And unfortunately, Arizona I think has become sort of the capital. We have become the mecca for prejudice and bigotry.’"

We writers must be constantly vigilant to the connotations of the words we use. It’s become more difficult, I think, because even objective reporting seems to have fallen by the wayside. A newscaster on a local TV station reported the latest “setback” to Shell’s offshore oil drilling in the Arctic, emphasizing the holdup “again” with such fervor we knew exactly what his opinion was. With the demise of objective reporting, our baseline shifts and it’s more difficult to recognize the emotional effects of the words we use. What was once considered inflammatory has become everyday language. We may think we’re becoming numb and therefore unaffected, but that’s only surface armor.

There used to be a children’s ditty: “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me.” Our attitudes towards playground bullying and verbal abuse have since changed, but now we have new ways to hurt with words: the great anonymity of the internet.

A few years ago, the Anchorage Daily News reported a house fire in which a man lost his wife and children. On the newspaper’s website, one anonymous reader suggested the man was to blame because he alone escaped from the house. I remain astonished and saddened that someone who didn’t even know this man would publicly pass judgement on him, and be allowed to do so anonymously. I only hope that he, and the family, never read those comments.

Many have noted that rhetoric in our country has reached epic levels of division, derision, and vitriol. Last week I met a young man studying rhetoric in college. We talked about the book Don’t Think of an Elephant , which explores how effective one political party has been in controlling the language of key issues. He told me about a paper he’d just finished on how Sarah Palin’s rhetoric has changed political discourse in this country, especially her use of shooting imagery. Representative Giffords was one of 20 Palin put in her “crosshairs” in the recent election.

There’s simply no doubt: the power we wield as writers is real. We need to take care that we express ourselves without causing—to use military rhetoric for unintended killings—collateral damage.

Marybeth Holleman is author of The Heart of the Sound: An Alaskan Paradise Found and Nearly Lost, and co-editor with Anne Coray of Crosscurrents North: Alaskans on the Environment. She'll be discussing the topic of environmental writing and activism with author Nancy Lord and moderator Charles Wohlforth at a 49 Alaska Writing Center CROSSCURRENTS event at Out North Theater on Jan. 25 at 7 pm.

Deb: DIYMFA – A Progress Report

If money were no object, I’d have spent the last few years researching and applying to MFA programs; with any luck, I’d be enrolled in one now. But as with much of life, money is an issue, and so instead I embarked last year on what I hope will be the next best thing: a Do It Yourself Master of Fine Arts (DIYMFA) program.

I’ll receive no diploma, and I won’t be any better qualified to teach at the university level than I am with my Master of Arts degree. But neither of those rewards matter much at this point in my life. Several years ago, I voluntarily left a university tenure track position, and though I love teaching, I don’t especially aspire to another university job. And my other diplomas are stashed in a closet, so I guess I don't need another of those either.

What I’d love about an MFA program would be the opportunities to study with top-notch authors whose work I admire, to get meaningful critiques of my work, to read voraciously and systematically in ways that would enhance the quality of my writing, and to engage with a dynamic community of writers who share my goals. The ultimate goal would be writing that is better, richer, and truer any I’ve done before. In particular, I wanted to expand my published work (fiction and nonfiction for children; non-fiction and travel for adults) into quality fiction for adults.

A do-it-yourself program can’t provide the same set of experiences that I’d get in an MFA program, but I set out to fashion one that I hoped would improve my writing in meaningful ways. I honed my list of aspirational writers and began reading and rereading, paying careful attention to how they created the prose I admire. To that I added reading lists from Jayne Anne Phillips and David Vann, two authors/instructors I admire. Through this blog, I found other writers I could meet with monthly for camaraderie and critiquing. Between freelance projects and the surge of effort required to get the 49 Alaska Writing Center up and running, I planned a foray into fiction for adults, in the form of short stories. I figured I’d give myself two years.

Now that Year One of my DIYFMA experience is history, I thought I should offer a brief report to you, my extended online accountability group (at least that’s how I think of you in DIYMFA terms). I didn’t get through all the reading I assigned to myself, but I tackled a fair chunk of it, discovering new insights – and a few new aspirational writers – along the way. I only drafted one of the low-stakes short stories I’d intended, but I did draft a young adult novel that shows some promise, though it’s technically not aligned with my adult fiction goal. (DIYFMA note to self: it’s easy to get sidetracked.) The low-stakes short story, recently revised, is also the start of a novel for adults.

But part of my DIYMFA philosophy is that the quality of my writing is more important than how much I’m writing. I’m trying to engage in new ways of thinking and working, inspired by my DIYMFA “teachers,” including David Vann, with whom I was privileged to study in person at the 2010 49 Writers Tutka Bay Retreat. That retreat was the seminal experience of my first DIYMFA year. From it, I can only imagine the abundance of rich adventures that are part of a real MFA program, though I know not all teachers and writers are the caliber of David Vann.

For my DIY program this year, I’ve put together a reading list of thirty books, and I hope to finish my novel for adults, giving it the patience and care I hope it deserves. And I’m wondering: are there any other DIYMFA’ers out there?