I have decided to break all my different writing down into projects that I work on daily. Meaning everyday, after I journal, write one short story and send out submissions I will start on a project until it is complete to my satisfaction...and yes that means it will take me an extremely long time to finish one project, but a writer is always busy and always working on something, meaning if I feel bored with this one project I am working on I will move on for that day and work on another project on my list, however I will always start by workign on the first project. Let's review (more for me than you) Everyday writing routine:
1) Journal-warm up
2)Write short story- I'm workign on a series of short stories based off of paintings right now
3)Send out at least one submission-I've tried to make the goal 5 or 10 in the past and then I never move beyond this point, because before I send out a submission I will always read it one last time and edit it as I see fit
4) work on project- project list soon to come
I know so far, that project #1 will be a huge way to improve my blog. I will research it and make my blog something exciting that people will actually want to read and I won't necessarily be embarassed to tell people about.
Wednesday, March 31, 2010
Saturday, March 27, 2010
826 Michigan
826 Michigan Ann Arbor has become my new favorite place in the world and I am only a volunteer. It is a writing/tutor center that provides many services to students for all levels of advancement. I only wish that I knew about this place or these services were provided to me as a young'in. During the day this center helps students within their schools with on site classroom help, in the afternoon they provide tutoring in all subjects at their store and in the evening/weekend there is often a fundraiser or workshop. So far, I've participated in helping with their field trip-where the class visits the writing center and also one of their workshops entitled "Famous Women Writers and You."
The experience that 826 Michigan gives these classes when they visit on a field trip cannot be duplicated elsewhere. Roles have been created for everyone to play before the children get there. There is a storyteller, illustrator, typist, and most of all...Dr. Blotch who is the boss in charge of approving everyone's stories so everyone can keep their job. The children start by collaboratively writing a story as the storyteller guides them along..until Dr. Blotch interrupts (through skype...so none of the kids actually know what Dr. Blotch looks like or where Dr. Blotch is located) and Dr. Blotch demands stories from each child. So, all the kids break up and write a different ending to the story they started together. At the end, much to everyone's doubt Dr. Blotch approves all the stories and each child has a binded version of their book to take home. It was something that I found myself getting lost in and I had a smile on my face for the rest of the day.
The workshop "Famous Women Writers and You" was a little more serious. There were more facilitators at the workshop than there was actual students taking the workshop, but the students were older teenage girls and so we could all relate with each other. The workshop was run by a student from U of M named Amy who majored in women studies and literature. We read and discussed six different women writers. Some of the more interesting discussion questions bordered on why many of their books had been band? and What they all had in common? I learned about an essay written by Virginia Wolfe entitled "Shakespeare's Sister" which concludes that for every famous male writer there is a less credited female writer parallel them. At the end of the workshop, we all wrote and some of us shared our writing. Seeing at least ten aspiring women writers together at a table reading what they had just written to each other was the perfect wrap up to such a workshop.
I look forward to participating in future workshops at 826 Michigan in Ann Arbor. :)
The experience that 826 Michigan gives these classes when they visit on a field trip cannot be duplicated elsewhere. Roles have been created for everyone to play before the children get there. There is a storyteller, illustrator, typist, and most of all...Dr. Blotch who is the boss in charge of approving everyone's stories so everyone can keep their job. The children start by collaboratively writing a story as the storyteller guides them along..until Dr. Blotch interrupts (through skype...so none of the kids actually know what Dr. Blotch looks like or where Dr. Blotch is located) and Dr. Blotch demands stories from each child. So, all the kids break up and write a different ending to the story they started together. At the end, much to everyone's doubt Dr. Blotch approves all the stories and each child has a binded version of their book to take home. It was something that I found myself getting lost in and I had a smile on my face for the rest of the day.
The workshop "Famous Women Writers and You" was a little more serious. There were more facilitators at the workshop than there was actual students taking the workshop, but the students were older teenage girls and so we could all relate with each other. The workshop was run by a student from U of M named Amy who majored in women studies and literature. We read and discussed six different women writers. Some of the more interesting discussion questions bordered on why many of their books had been band? and What they all had in common? I learned about an essay written by Virginia Wolfe entitled "Shakespeare's Sister" which concludes that for every famous male writer there is a less credited female writer parallel them. At the end of the workshop, we all wrote and some of us shared our writing. Seeing at least ten aspiring women writers together at a table reading what they had just written to each other was the perfect wrap up to such a workshop.
I look forward to participating in future workshops at 826 Michigan in Ann Arbor. :)
Friday, March 26, 2010
What I've Been Reading to Become a Writer
The first book I read was about marketing and becoming known as a writer to begin with was called: Get Known Before the Book Deal written by Christina Katz, who I have gone so far as to become facebook friends with her. Her audience is mostly mothers who want to become writers, but as a post graduate student I found her information extremely helpful. Her book has caused me to join three different regional writer's associations, start volunteering at a local writing center, and yes, even start this blog. This was no end to her suggestions as to how to put yourself out there as a writer and I must say, even if the name Angela Michelle Scott does not carry any weight yet, I do feel like I am participating in more of the writing community now. If only I could afford to go to conferences as she suggests, but at least now I know to save money for them.
The second book, which I am only about half way through with at this point is called: Getting Started as a Freelance Writer written by Robert W. Bly. I have not found it extremely helpful so far and in general it seems to be way too optimistic. I cannot count the number of times he has told everyone how much he makes as a freelance writer, $600,000, which I have memorized because I think he brags about his success in every other sentence. That is great for him, but please share more details about how you got there and don't start with negotiating fees and fines for writing...because for someone just starting this is way over our head! Finally, on about page 70 it explains to the reader where they may start to look for entry-level jobs, this is the only thing that has proven helpful to me thus far, the rest of the beginning should probably be for a more advanced freelance writer than an entry-level one.
The second book, which I am only about half way through with at this point is called: Getting Started as a Freelance Writer written by Robert W. Bly. I have not found it extremely helpful so far and in general it seems to be way too optimistic. I cannot count the number of times he has told everyone how much he makes as a freelance writer, $600,000, which I have memorized because I think he brags about his success in every other sentence. That is great for him, but please share more details about how you got there and don't start with negotiating fees and fines for writing...because for someone just starting this is way over our head! Finally, on about page 70 it explains to the reader where they may start to look for entry-level jobs, this is the only thing that has proven helpful to me thus far, the rest of the beginning should probably be for a more advanced freelance writer than an entry-level one.
My weekly steps to becoming a writer....
There were a few things I promised myself I would do in order to work on becoming a writer...
1) I would go to more readings from other authors
2) I would become less shy about my writing
3) Join a writing community, so as not to forget how much I love it
4) Always journal, always blog
5) Work on writing...duh
So what did I get done this week?
On Thursday, March 18 I traveled out the the MOCAD- Museum of Contemporary Art in Detroit where there was a poetry reading by K. Silem Mohammad, he was described by the MOCAD as "a modern outlaw, a controversial figure crafting art, in the form of poetry and prose pieces, from stolen moments of conversation, fragments of advertisements and procured bits of arcane apocrypha. One of the leaders of the “Flarf” poetry movement, K. Silem Mohammad’s work has succeeded in reigniting interest in the form by inviting equal amounts of praise and scorn for it’s use of phrases and terms culled directly from Google searches and the lowliest of cultural forms. Blogs, chat rooms, and long-since forgotten and discredited texts become finely rendered anti-forms in the hands of the craftsman, Mohammad."
This description did do him justice, in the sense that his poetry produced many shout outs to bands, pop culture and items people would be familiar with a google search. He started his reading by doing a few random poems, including one that was published in poetry magazine, that he himself announced as a random publication. Specifically from this poem I remember the words "Some poems are shaped like trees, kids are stupid," which I was a little taken aback by, but the name of this poem was "Poems about Trees" and questioned why we bothered to write about trees and it is true that kids are known for knowing less than adults and might think a poem is a good poem if it is shaped like a tree. However, perhaps my poetry skills still need work, but I fail to see what poetry magazine saw in this poem as genius to publish it.
He also read a few poems from a book he completed where he took Shakespeare's sonnets and mixed up all the characters and created new sonnets in Iambic pentameter, using any left over letters as the title which he informed us was his way of cheating. I was impressed more with this concept than the actual poems themselves, though I did find he was able to scramble up Shakespeare's beautiful sonnets into words of modern day pop culture, where every poem he read basically had a band name in it. I am a Shakespeare fan, but a friend of mine, named Jon, has me questioning whether we credit people who build off of Shakespeare too much when I told him about the event and I somewhat agree with Jon. If this poet had decided to build off of someone else's poetry would he be given as much credit.
Later that night the group of people at the reading went with the poet to a cafe in Detroit. I sat at the other end of the table from Mohammad, who did not really prove himself to be a people person, and found that much of this crowd were ambitious writers such as myself. One girl that I sat next too, had applied to nine graduate schools and only was admitted to one, which goes to show how competitive the field really has become.
However, my lesson that night was one way to learn the field and make connections within the field is to observe it and I will look for future poetry readings at the MOCAD.
1) I would go to more readings from other authors
2) I would become less shy about my writing
3) Join a writing community, so as not to forget how much I love it
4) Always journal, always blog
5) Work on writing...duh
So what did I get done this week?
On Thursday, March 18 I traveled out the the MOCAD- Museum of Contemporary Art in Detroit where there was a poetry reading by K. Silem Mohammad, he was described by the MOCAD as "a modern outlaw, a controversial figure crafting art, in the form of poetry and prose pieces, from stolen moments of conversation, fragments of advertisements and procured bits of arcane apocrypha. One of the leaders of the “Flarf” poetry movement, K. Silem Mohammad’s work has succeeded in reigniting interest in the form by inviting equal amounts of praise and scorn for it’s use of phrases and terms culled directly from Google searches and the lowliest of cultural forms. Blogs, chat rooms, and long-since forgotten and discredited texts become finely rendered anti-forms in the hands of the craftsman, Mohammad."
This description did do him justice, in the sense that his poetry produced many shout outs to bands, pop culture and items people would be familiar with a google search. He started his reading by doing a few random poems, including one that was published in poetry magazine, that he himself announced as a random publication. Specifically from this poem I remember the words "Some poems are shaped like trees, kids are stupid," which I was a little taken aback by, but the name of this poem was "Poems about Trees" and questioned why we bothered to write about trees and it is true that kids are known for knowing less than adults and might think a poem is a good poem if it is shaped like a tree. However, perhaps my poetry skills still need work, but I fail to see what poetry magazine saw in this poem as genius to publish it.
He also read a few poems from a book he completed where he took Shakespeare's sonnets and mixed up all the characters and created new sonnets in Iambic pentameter, using any left over letters as the title which he informed us was his way of cheating. I was impressed more with this concept than the actual poems themselves, though I did find he was able to scramble up Shakespeare's beautiful sonnets into words of modern day pop culture, where every poem he read basically had a band name in it. I am a Shakespeare fan, but a friend of mine, named Jon, has me questioning whether we credit people who build off of Shakespeare too much when I told him about the event and I somewhat agree with Jon. If this poet had decided to build off of someone else's poetry would he be given as much credit.
Later that night the group of people at the reading went with the poet to a cafe in Detroit. I sat at the other end of the table from Mohammad, who did not really prove himself to be a people person, and found that much of this crowd were ambitious writers such as myself. One girl that I sat next too, had applied to nine graduate schools and only was admitted to one, which goes to show how competitive the field really has become.
However, my lesson that night was one way to learn the field and make connections within the field is to observe it and I will look for future poetry readings at the MOCAD.
Thursday, March 18, 2010
Introduction
Me? My name is Angela Michelle Scott and I started this blog because I tend to romanticize everything in my life, whether I like it or not and it has it's ups and downs. I graduated with a bachelor in arts from Eastern Michigan University with a triple major in Creative Writing, Art History and Comprehensive Communications and Theatre arts...but I feel as though my education really started after graduation day, when I was thrown to the pack of wolves in the world.
I am a writer through and through and even though I'm like the many who hope to become published one day, I would write regardless. That's what real writers do, they write regardless of who's reading, it's as natural as breathing and while our mind wanders we have visions of typing everything out on a keyboard.
I have a strong interest in art and as mentioned before studied art history but just recently, since taking a journal/sketch at the interlochen writer's retreat this summer 2010 have I been playing with different artistic mediums myself.
So, join me on my life journey as an aspiring author and beginning level artist...after all art is my only outlet to express how I see and perceive the world.
I am a writer through and through and even though I'm like the many who hope to become published one day, I would write regardless. That's what real writers do, they write regardless of who's reading, it's as natural as breathing and while our mind wanders we have visions of typing everything out on a keyboard.
I have a strong interest in art and as mentioned before studied art history but just recently, since taking a journal/sketch at the interlochen writer's retreat this summer 2010 have I been playing with different artistic mediums myself.
So, join me on my life journey as an aspiring author and beginning level artist...after all art is my only outlet to express how I see and perceive the world.
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