30
December
2012

Don’t read this blog post. Read this: Linds Redding. “A Short Lesson in Perspective.”

You’ve probably never heard of Linds Redding.  He was an art director who spent his life creating advertisements for other people’s products.  Then he died.  He was 52.  Shortly before his death from esophageal cancer, he wrote a blog piece called “A Short Lesson in Perspective.”  If you aspire to work in a creative industry […]

15
December
2012

The Dream of the Rood: This is a joke, right?

So I’m reading The Dream of the Rood.  I don’t do it a lot.  It’s the late seventh century. It’s possibly late enough to be the early eighth, but at this remove who knows?  It’s also possibly somewhere in the Kingdom of Northumbria, near Dumfries.  There’s a stone cross up there on which somebody carved […]

30
November
2012

Do you sport a fake British accent? If so, why?

Over the past month, several people have mentioned to me their annoyance with Americans who rock a British accent.  I’m talking about people who don’t know each other, bringing this up in entirely different contexts.  I had no idea that faking an accent was the latest form of pretension, so I obviously need to get […]

11
July
2012

Make Yourself Holy

To write fiction, you must make yourself holy.  This is how.  Immerse your heart in the dirty world.  Crawl in its decay.  Shout out its meager glories.  Then leave.  Then write.  Then put down your pen and make dinner. It’s an odd pastime, fiction writing.  First you must know the world intimately.  Then you must […]