Skeletons, Ghosts, and Shadows

If you wish to be a writer, write.
                                        -- Epictetus


On Saturday, I went to a workshop on writing children's picture books. The teacher was Barbara Bottner, truly the rock star diva of pictures and truly a gifted teacher.


Even if one had no writing aspirations lurking in one's bosom (in which case one would be rare indeed), one would have benefited from her teaching, which offered a mix of general life instruction (know yourself, be authentic) in addition to the highly specific (and immensely useful) writing instruction having to do with language, tone, plot structure, characterization, and so on.


It was such a fantastic surprise that Ms. Bottner began by explaining the pressing need to rummage around in the dark subconscious closets and haul out what we've made sure to pack deep in the recesses because we've been afraid or unwilling to look at, think about, or even admit the presence of what's creeping about in there. They being the source of our conflicts and therefore the drivers of our actions.


Lately I've spent much time reviewing passages and what I'm seeing is that boring writing is superficial and disconnected -- from real life (lacks detail) and from human experience (lacks heart, lacks authentic expression of emotion and experience). I corresponded with a writer today about her poem, which I loved for its sheer discipline and precision, and she said it was fun to write.


No surprises there: in On Writing Well, Zinsser talks about "the intangibles that produce good writing--confidence, enjoyment, intention, and integrity."


As for me, it's a pleasure to work with writers who are having fun and it's even a greater pleasure when the fun shows up and waves at me from the page.

Bittersweet

The discovery of a new joy is sometimes accompanied by a sense of regret for what I've lost by not having discovered it sooner. When I began studying with Mr. Mudrick, I knew that I had missed a lot of what had come before.

As little as I knew of anything -- my ignorance was spectacular even for a college sophomore -- even I could see his greatness, his remarkable brilliance, his sheer goodness, his wit (he was such an entertainer!). His genius wasn't just literary; he understood being human more than anyone I've ever known. To see what I mean, read Mudrick Transcribed: Classes and Talks, a book of his lectures carefully recorded by fellow student Lance Kaplan, or Well, Mr. Mudrick Said, a memoir by friend and fellow student Bob Blaisdell.

I knew that I would be the fool of all fools if I didn't take every class he taught until I graduated. But there was always that regret that I missed a year and a half, that five university quarters had passed during which I could have been listened to Mr. Mudrick. It was time I had lost and would never get back.

My first memory of this kind of regret is when I read David Copperfield. I was eight. Seeking refuge from the din and chaos of what passed for daycare in those days, I'd wandered into the den and shut the door behind me. The den was furnished with black vinyl recliners and dark bookcases twice my height. The bookcases were filled with Reader's Digest editions and Book-of-the-Month hardbacks still in glossy book jackets. All were pristine. I doubt whether any of the books had ever been opened.

I liked the name David Copperfield and I liked how it looked in the gold lettering on the spine. I read all day, sitting on the shiny blue shag carpet. When I began reading, I was sitting in a square of bright sunlight. When the babysitter (herself a Dickensian character, being as wide as she was tall, with her topping of curly orange hair, her pale freckled skin, her face slightly smashed in, as if it had been formed of clay and then the top and bottom ends squished together to push the center inward, and her relentless grimness) opened to door to call me, she scolded me for reading in the dark. 

That night, lying in bed, David Copperfield was all I could think about. Both how much I loved it, and how angry I was that this amazing and wonderful world had existed all this time without my knowledge. Why didn't anyone ever tell me?

This must be the greatest aspiration for a writer: to inspire this feeling in a reader.

(I'd been planning to write about craftsmanship. I'm reading another writing manual, Writing Tools: 50 Essential Strategies for Every Writer by Roy Peter Clark, which had come recommended and is well worth the read, and which in its devotion to and insistence upon writerly craftsmanship made me think of that master craftsman, Anthony Trollope, who began writing every morning at 5:30 at a pace of 250 words per quarter hour. I was introduced to Trollope's novels in college, and it was love at the first turn of the page. And yes, that turn of the page was accompanied by a twinge of regret that I hadn't known of and read Trollope sooner. I made up for it as best I could -- and keep making up for it. He wrote a lot.)


UPDATE: More on regret from the NYT here.

Words to Write By

Writing is related to character. If your values are sound, your writing will be sound. It all begins with intention. Figure out what you want to do and how you want to do it, and work your way with humanity and integrity to the completed article.

From On Writing Well: The Classic Guide to Writing Nonfiction by William Zinsser.


I recommend books on writing about as often as I read books on writing--which is to say never.


Though it has been many years since I graduated from college, I still can't quite believe my luck in having studied writing (and literature) with the greatest of teachers: Marvin Mudrick. Nowhere to go after him.


But I couldn't and didn't--though I wish I could have--memorize every word he said about literature and writing. Hence the utility and pleasure of a book like On Writing Well. It is truly a pleasure to read. How many manuals or guides can you say that about?


If you are a writer and you haven't read it, do. You'll be so glad you did. If you know everything Zinsser tells you, you'll feel gratified; if you learn something new, you'll profit from it.

Shame, Cross-Referenced to Morally Reprehensible, Really? Still?, and Just Plain Sorry

I'm reading The Shame of the Nation: The Restoration of Apartheid Schooling in America by Jonathon Kozol. I'd read writing by Kozol before, and this news is, unfortunately, no news to me. It's been seven years since its publication, and there doesn't seem any indication that there's been any reform in desegregating the schools:

Looking specifically at racial segregation, both White flight and minority flight are evidenced in charter schools. Compounding the effects of the nation’s highly segregated neighborhoods, policy makers must consider the economic, social and ethnic segregative effects of charter schools along with potential segregation that may be driven by other forms of school choice.

(As reported in the Daily Kos a few months ago. I'm a little behind on my blog-reading.) 

It's not just charter schools, as reported in Colorlines:

But now more than ever, mustering the energy to address, head-on, the roots of educational inequities is an issue of utmost urgency. Students of color are 44 percent, and growing, of the U.S. public school system. Racial segregation is a legacy we’ve yet to shake off, nowhere more than in American public schools, where students of color are educated in schools that are today both separate and unequal.

I believe this, in spite of Clarence Thomas:

"It never ceases to amaze me that the courts are so willing to assume that anything that is predominantly black must be inferior. Instead of focusing on remedying the harm done to those black schoolchildren injured by segregation, the District Court here sought to convert the Kansas City, Missouri, School District (KCMSD) into a "magnet district" that would reverse the "white flight" caused by desegregation.... there is no reason to think that black students cannot learn as well when surrounded by members of their own race as when they are in an integrated environment."  --Justice Clarence Thomas, 1995, Missouri v. Jenkins concurring opinion

(Speaking of amazement, that Thomas could write this without his pen bursting into flames of hellfire amazes me. If I may speak frankly.) It's not that the students isolated by policies that establish and inexorably enforce segregation "cannot learn as well," but rather that the segregation creates inequities that necessarily rob students of opportunities and tools for learning, that rob them of even a decent environment in which to learn. Which I think we can all agree (in theory, anyway) is still a right in the United States, rather than the privilege it has become--an idea supported by the New Jersey Supreme Court last year:

The New Jersey Supreme Court delivered a sharp setback to Gov. Chris Christie's determination to destroy New Jersey's public schools. The court by a 3 to 2 vote on May 24 voted to uphold the New Jersey state constitution's provision which guarantees a "thorough and efficient" education to all New Jersey children. The court ruled that the Christie administration must restore $500 million to the state's 31 poorest school districts.

Back in 2005, when The Shame of the Nation was first published, Nathan Glazer responded in the NYT with the kneejerk white majority response of Yes, yes, but it's not that simple, and Who, me? I'm not racist:

TO be sure, the case for both integration and equality of expenditure is powerful. But the chief obstacle to achieving these goals does not seem to be the indifference of whites and the nonpoor to the education of nonwhites and the poor, although this is what one would conclude from Kozol's account. Rather, other values, which are not simply shields for racism, stand in the way: the value of the neighborhood school; the value of local control of education and, above all, the value of freedom from state imposition when it affects matters so personal as the future of one's children.

Unbelievable. But maybe the NYT was just trying to stir it with a stick, you know how public feuds are fun to read, and Glazer was someone that Kozol had "criticized severely and repeatedly" in the past, so really, how likely would it be that Glazer would be willing to extend the right hand of fellowship and seek common ground?


Here is a tiny bit of Kozol's response to the above quote from Glazer:

Is it not strange that no such exculpation was provided by Mr. Glazer or by any other reputable Northern intellectuals to white segregationists in Mississippi when they raised exactly the same clarion call of "freedom from state imposition'' (or, in that case, "federal imposition'') to defend their own apartheid system 50 years ago? Why was it so transparently "racism'' in the South? And why is it now conveniently discovered to be "other values'' when it comes to Northern states such as New York?

(The whole of Kozol's response is well worth reading--you can read it here.)


As a nation, as citizens, as neighbors, as fellow parents, as human beings--how can we allow this to continue? How can we participate in this as if there is any kind of reasonable justification? It's wrong. And if we cannot understand how we are hurting children, can we understand how we are hurting ourselves by so doing? 


UPDATE: Fixed typo. You know the drill.

Mi Flow

. . . en las palabras inmortales de Baby Ranks.


As discussed previously, flow is that state of optimal creativity, focus, and absorption. As described by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi.


Cows are pastured where my dog and I walk in the mornings. Our schedule and that of the cows don't usually coincide (those cows must have many big busy doings, for they are more often absent than present), but when they do, it's a thrill.

My dog was bred to tend and guard grazing animals. (On both sides; she's a mix of Belgian Tervuren and chow chow.) She is no slouch at guarding, as anyone who's ever walked past my car or been to my house can attest. I wouldn't want to be our mail carrier. As to her herding skills--let's just say her opportunities to prove her mettle are limited. I don't let her herd me, and my daughters just push her out of the way when she tries to herd them.


So when she catches sight of those cows--it's deep calling to deep. One can see that she feels inspired to the depths of her soul to go and herd those cows.

Everyone should feel that calling, right? It's a great feeling.




UPDATE: 4/2/12--Today the dog got loose and herded the cows up the hills and through the brush down to the pasture. When you get close to a cow, you are shocked by how big they are. They make a lot of noise crashing through the brush. The dog had a wonderful time, but when she turned her attention to a calf, I was worried the mother would kick her. She was back on the leash before anyone--bovine or canine--got hurt. When we passed by later, the cows seemed none the worse for the exercise. The dog is exhausted. I think it was the best day of her life. So far.

Getting Our House in Order

What is fun about homeschooling is a lot. All those lectures in the car to a captive audience? (Parents, you know what I'm talking about.) I get to make my kids take notes while I'm talking. Heheheheheheheh.


The regime schedule includes vocabulary study, a subject about which I hold strong opinions. For proficient readers, I believe vocabulary study best takes place in context, so one required activity is that the girls keep a notebook in which they write down every unfamiliar word.


Yesterday we were reading together (I was reading "The Law of Genre" by Derrida, don't ask, because anyone who knows me knows how I feel about deconstruction, but more on that in another post; Naomi was finishing Rebecca), and I came across an unfamiliar word ("liminal") and looked up the definition, and in so doing, we talked about what we thought it meant, both from the context and prior knowledge ("subliminal"). (In the same essay, I stumbled upon "invaginate." Diction is so telling, is it not. Talk about subliminal. Although my French is so poor that I'm unable to tell whether the choice of "invaginate" was necessary or creative license on the part of the translator.) And yes, "liminal" meant exactly what we thought.


In addition to keeping a record of unfamiliar words, the girls must find a definition and then write a sentence with each word, a sentence that provides enough context that would allow the reader to determine the meaning of the word.


Which meant that the topic of one of our commuting lectures was context clues, and specifically how context clues provide information about word meaning:

• restatement/definition--In which a synonym or paraphrase is provided:

All compromise is based on give and take, but there can be no give and take on fundamentals. Any compromise on mere fundamentals is a surrender. For it is all give and no take. --Mahatma Gandi [This example also uses contrast, which is described below.]

Restatement and definition cues are sometimes cued by punctuation, such as commas or parentheses:

A system of morality which is based on relative emotional values is a mere illusion, a thoroughly vulgar conception which has nothing sound in it and nothing true. -- Socrates 

• example--In which one or more illustrative examples are provided. The use of example may also be cued by punctuation: 

Ignorance more frequently begets confidence than does knowledge: it is those who know little, and not those who know much, who so positively assert that this or that problem will never be solved by science. -- Charles Darwin

• contrast--In which the opposite is provided:

There exists a kind of laughter which is worthy to be ranked with the higher lyric emotions and is infinitely different from the twitchings of a mean merrymaker.--Nikolai Gogol 

He is a wise man who does not grieve for the things he has not, but rejoices for those which he has. -- Epictetus 

As far as I'm concerned, I prefer silent vice to ostentatious virtue. -- Albert Einstein

• restriction--In which the use of other words in the sentence limits the possible meaning of a word (some like to call this the use of key words, to which I say "tomato, tomahto"):

A high station in life is earned  by the gallantry with which appalling experiences are survived with grace. -- Tennessee Williams 

It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent that survives. It is the species that is the most adaptable to change. -- Charles Darwin

Of these basic categories, infinite variety may exist. That is, restriction clues may indicate relationship, such as cause and effect:

As in nature, as in art, so in grace: it is rough treatment that gives souls, as well as stones, their luster. -- Thomas Guthrie

And examples may be given as part of a system of classification:

Raptors, such as hawks, eagles, kites, and falcons, are known to be diurnal.

This is a foundational concept to ELA content development, both in terms of passage and item development. Writers of passages must build in context clues for difficult words, particularly words that are above grade level or words that have specific technical meanings; item writers must be sure to select target vocabulary words for which there are sufficient clues in the text for the reader to determine meanings.


Once this is explained, it probably seems fairly basic. You may already know all of this. But given the lack of training and lack of experience (because believe me, all you have to do in order to have the importance of this concept seared into your soul is to attend one item review committee meeting attended by master teachers with a solid grasp of the underlying principles of vocabulary acquisition) we see nowadays in content developers (already deplored previously), many item writers have no clue idea about context clues. They have no understanding of what real context clues look like, how context clues are created, nor of how readers rely on context clues -- these inexperienced or untrained item writers have no understanding that reading is a systematic process that relies on a variety of extremely complex skills, of which this is one, and even this one is very complex and employs different processes. Which means that the work they do is going to be fundamentally unsound.


When you go to build a house, you first make sure to lay a solid foundation. Make sure that house is built upon a rock.


More on vocabulary another time. I'm also big on word structure and derivatives, as you might have guessed.


P.S. Just for fun: a word frequency analyzer. You can see how language usage changes over time. Another way to while away the minutes.


UPDATE: Fixed a typo.
UDATE THE SECOND: And two others. Goodness gracious.

Get Ready!

It's not too early to start making your arrangements to attend that conference of conferences sponsored by the Society of Children's Book Writers and Illustrators, which takes place August 3-6, 2012. Mark your calendars and start checking Priceline.

The annual SCBWI conference is where you want to be. Fun. Inspiring. Informative. And you're surrounded by creative, smart, interesting people. Gorgeous art for children's books. Great writers giving you advice. Glitter, glitter everywhere. If you even think you might possibly one day consider the hint of the eventuality of maybe writing or illustrating books for children, it's more than worth your while to attend.

This week's news: If anyone who aspires to write children's picture books be anywhere near this part of the world on March 24, there is a workshop at the E.P. Foster Library from 9-12. For more information, click here.

As far as everything else goes, we finish one project, we start another, we've got work to do and lots to think about, so it's all good and we've got a good feeling. In the immortal words of Etta James.

 


Happy St. Patrick's Day!