Making a Literary Life
by Carolyn See
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Book Summary Information
Author: Carolyn SeeEdition: Paperback
Audio: English (Unknown); English (Original Language); English (Published)
Published: 2003-08-26
ISBN: 0345440463
Number of pages: 288
Publisher: Ballantine Books
Book Reviews of Making a Literary Life
Book Review: This one is about YOUR writing life.....
Summary: 5 Stars
Carolyn See writes "Making a Literary Life" directly from her heart. Naturally, then, it is angled from her particular point of view and has suggestions some of the other reviewers might find a bit unattractive - and what I read in her words was this: Create your life as a writer who is fully herself. If that "fully herself" means writing personal notes - so be it. (I think this is something which sets a writer apart. I know as a publisher and editor who occasionally receives hand written notes.... They stand out from the onslaught of form letters, hastily scribed emails, etc.)
What is YOUR "fully yourself" action or practice which makes YOU are writer and forms YOUR literary life?
See glides through her examples with heartfulness, with truth, with integrity and with a wry sense of humor which helps you to say "Thank goodness she is human, and just like me... and survived being obsessed with the written word."
My favorite words in this entire book are these: "We live in a beautiful, sentient universe that yearns for you to tell the truth about it. If you love this world and this craft, they will lift you to a place you can't begin to imagine."
The writers who "get" those words will enjoy this work. Those writers who don't understand those words might be disappointed upon reading this book.
My heart-hope is you will both believe those words and live those words as you create your literary life.
Summary of Making a Literary Life
As Carolyn See says, writing guides are like preachers on Sunday?there may be a lot of them, but you can?t have too many, and there?s always an audience of the faithful. And while Making a Literary Life is ostensibly a book that teaches you how to write, it really teaches you how to make your interior life into your exterior life, how to find and join that community of like-minded souls you?re sure is out there somewhere.Carolyn See distills a lifetime of experience as novelist, memoirist, critic, and creative-writing professor into this marvelously engaging how-to book. Partly the nuts and bolts of writing (plot, point of view, character, voice) and partly an inspirational guide to living the life you dream of, Making a Literary Life takes you from the decision to ?become? a writer to three months after the publication of your first book. A combination of writing and life strategies (do not tell everyone around you how you yearn to be a writer; send a ?charming note? to someone you admire in the industry five days a week, every week, for the rest of your life; find the perfect characters right in front of you), Making a Literary Life is for people not usually considered part of the literary loop: the non?East Coasters, the secret scribblers.
With sagacity, a magical sense of humor, and an abiding belief in the possibilities offered to ?ordinary? people living ?ordinary? lives, Carolyn See has summed up her life?s work in a book so beguiling, irreverent, and giddily inspiring that you won?t even realize it?s changing your life until it already has.
From the Hardcover edition.
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