The Writer May 2014

NOT LONG AGO, I was sitting in the rush line to get a night-of ticket to a production of a Shakespeare play in New York City. The critics had declared the show a hit, but it was running for only three more nights, and every performance was sold out. Snow was pounding down hard that afternoon, and the wind was whipping with urban mercilessness. But none of those factors stopped a hardy group of us from trudging into the theater two hours before curtain to stand in line in the hopes of snagging tickets. We added our names to the waiting list and sat quietly, if anxiously, reading magazines or books or fiddling with smartphones. I was seventh in line. Just before the box-office manager began to reveal who would…

“Home is any four walls that enclose the right person.” In those 10 simple words, American journalisthumorist Helen Rowland succinctly summed up the mission of Write A House. The Detroit-based project, which was begun in 2012 by Detroit writers and urban activists, is based on an ingenious idea: Use vocational students to renovate empty houses and in turn give the homes to deserving writers – free – as a method for creating a more vibrant literary arts community in the Michigan city. Novelist Samuel Butler said, “An empty house is like a stray dog or a body from which life has departed,” and if Butler is correct, then the greater Detroit metropolitan area is overrun by packs of such canines, with more than 20,000 houses available at foreclosure auctions. The…

on character and listening Oonya Kempado’s All Decent Animals takes place in Trinidad and is richly populated with characters, sights and sounds. We caught up with Kempado at the Miami Book Fair International and asked her to talk about her creative process. WHEN YOU SAY A CHARACTER CAME TO YOU, WHAT DO YOU MEAN? In writing the characters, I was compelled by very urban and international Caribbean characters. The language of the novel reflects that, and reflects Trinidadian and Standard English. There was something that was missing from the story, something I wasn’t getting. I was writing a scene where I needed a taxi, and in writing it, Sammy developed. The way I could write his voice and his language blossomed, and he became a full person, this full character.…

Song lyrics combine the poetry form with a story narrative and the confessional elements of a personal essay. These award-winning lyricists share the principles of good songwriting, which have application across all genres. If there is a common thread to all that I find deep and beautiful in music (lyrics included), it is the truth that emerges from experience: lived, heard and read. The only constants I can personally rely on follow: You can never learn enough. Pay attention. Tell the truth or lie beautifully.” —J.D. Souther, songwriter for the Eagles Write the way people actually talk. You can use imagery and be poetic, of course, but the best lyrics sound like something people might actually say.” —Murray Horwitz, co-writer of the musical Ain’t Misbehavin’ Life experience. If you want…

While writing his breakout novel The Ice Storm, set in 1973, Rick Moody allowed himself to listen only to music popular in that year, and he mostly confined his reading to popular books as well. The Ice Storm became a critically acclaimed best-seller and was later made into a feature film directed by Ang Lee. Moody is also the author of four other novels, a collection of short fiction and two nonfiction books. He is the recipient of honors that include the PEN/Martha Albrand Award and the Paris Review Aga Khan Prize. His prose is finely tuned, and he has a keen ear for the rhythm of language, which, along with rich and sometimes quirky descriptive detail, helps to create an immersive experience for the reader. Take, for instance, this…

We asked our Facebook followers: What book made you want to become a writer? They offered an outstanding reading list we could not resist sharing with our print readers. • The Gunslinger • Fahrenheit 451 • Blackbird House • In God We Trust: All Others Pay Cash • Little Women • The Demon King • Harriet the Spy • The Complete Works of William Shakespeare • Walden • One Hundred Years of Solitude • Just Above Water: Prose Poems • The Adventures of Tom Sawyer • The Hobbit • Roots: The Saga of an American Family • The Color Purple • Their Eyes Were Watching God • Friday the Arapaho Indian • Shout at the Devil • A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail • Johnny…