This Monday’s roundup is a blast! It includes Mama Mia, family junk, the end of books, a writing contest, Ken Burns, and much, much more. I guarantee you won’t be bored!
- Ken Burns on the Power of History and Creativity. “Burns appeared at the Grand Hyatt New York last week to be honored in the seventh annual “Giants of Broadcasting” awards ceremony.” [Thanks to RJ McHatton of Inventive Productions LLC for alerting me to this item.]
- Anthony Zuiker’s plan to bury books. “As a first-time author, Anthony Zuiker nurtures an ambition that is surely unique in the annals of literature. It is to make publishing disappear, beginning this season with the release of Level 26: Dark Origins , a thriller that he and his publishers call the world’s first digi-novel.”
- Family History Writing Contest: December 31st Deadline. “Want to win a great award with many benefits? Then it is time to enter your family history in the NGS Family History Writing Contest!This contest is open to NGS [Natiomal Genealogical Society] members only.”
- Mamma Mia: Memoir Model. “…why do I claim this totally fictitious, over-the-top comedy musical is a model for writing memoir? Precisely because it takes isolated fragments of story (each song is a tiny story) and pulls them together into a coherent overall story, woven together with some added narrative to give setting, context, and consistent meaning. Furthermore, the songs are used quite randomly, not at all in the order they were written.”
- People’s ‘junk’ can tell interesting family story. “A group of women in Austin have formed a Story Circle Network, which has sponsored Older Women’s Legacy in which they encourage women, who are generally the family story keepers, to use the stories about the origins and personal feelings about their junque as the starting point for writing their family stories for future generations. Men can borrow the method, too.”
- History from front step inspired writer. “Whether it’s written in a book or on a website, when it comes to preserving the history of Calgary, the stories are the most important things.”
- Carpe Diem: Poems for Making the Most of Time. “Carpe diem remains an enduring rhetorical device in poetry because it is a sentiment that possesses an elasticity of meaning, suggesting both possibility and futility.” [ Thanks to Ed Darrell at Millard Fillmore’s Bathtub for alerting me to this item.]
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I always look forward to your Monday roundup. I particularly liked the link to stories about family junk. Another interesting story-starter, particularly for women, is their name, particularly since women often have a complicated history of name changes.
@cj madigan. Thanks, cj. I sometimes use the “name” story-starter in workshops. I usually ask people to form pairs and then ask each other, “What’s the story of your name?” It generates lots of discussion and it’s a fun way to break the ice.