Friday

May 23, 1997

The Short Man

by Robert Lax

FRIDAY 5/23

Today's Reading:"The Short Man" by Robert Lax from LOVE HAD A COMPASS, published by Grove Press (1996).

The Florida Folk Festival begins today at Stephen Foster State Folk Culture Center in White Springs.

Today is the first day of the Sacramento Jazz Jubilee, the largest traditional jazz festival in the world.

The Hay-On-Wye Festival of Literature begins today in Powys, Wales.

It's the birthday of poet Jane Kenyon (THE BOAT OF QUIET OF HOURS; LET EVENING COME; OTHERWISE), born in Ann Arbor, Michigan, in 1947. She died of leukemia at the age of 47 in 1995.

Electrical engineer Robert A. Moog, creator of the Moog synthesizer, was born on this day in Flushing, New York, 1934.

Outlaws Bonnie Parker and Clyde Barrow were gunned down on this day in 1934 by a group of Texas Rangers in Plain Dealing, Louisiana.

It's the birthday of singer Rosemary Clooney ("Come on-a My House"), born on this day in Maysville, Kentucky, 1928.

Big band vocalist Helen O'Connell was born in 1920 on this day in Lima, Ohio.

It's the birthday of bandleader and clarinetist Artie Shaw, born in New York City in 1910.

It's the birthday of physicist John Bardeen, who, with William Shockley and Walter Brattain, invented the transistor, coining the term by putting together transfer and resistor. He was born in Madison, Wisconsin, in 1908.

It's the birthday of Swedish writer Par Lagerkvist (THE DWARF; BARABBAS), born in Vaxjo, Sweden, in 1891.

Botanist Carl Linnaeus, who developed the first systematic method of classifying and naming plants, was born on this day in Rashult, Sweden, in 1707.

Be well, do good work, and keep in touch.®

 

«

»

  • “Writers end up writing stories—or rather, stories' shadows—and they're grateful if they can, but it is not enough. Nothing the writer can do is ever enough” —Joy Williams
  • “I want to live other lives. I've never quite believed that one chance is all I get. Writing is my way of making other chances.” —Anne Tyler
  • “Writing is a performance, like singing an aria or dancing a jig” —Stephen Greenblatt
  • “All good writing is swimming under water and holding your breath.” —F. Scott Fitzgerald
  • “Good writing is always about things that are important to you, things that are scary to you, things that eat you up.” —John Edgar Wideman
  • “In certain ways writing is a form of prayer.” —Denise Levertov
  • “Writing is a socially acceptable form of schizophrenia.” —E.L. Doctorow
  • “Writing is like driving at night in the fog. You can only see as far as your headlights, but you can make the whole trip that way.” —E.L. Doctorow
  • “Let's face it, writing is hell.” —William Styron
  • “A writer is someone for whom writing is more difficult than it is for other people.” —Thomas Mann
  • “Writing is 90 percent procrastination: reading magazines, eating cereal out of the box, watching infomercials.” —Paul Rudnick
  • “Writing is a failure. Writing is not only useless, it's spoiled paper.” —Padget Powell
  • “Writing is very hard work and knowing what you're doing the whole time.” —Shelby Foote
  • “I think all writing is a disease. You can't stop it.” —William Carlos Williams
  • “Writing is like getting married. One should never commit oneself until one is amazed at one's luck.” —Iris Murdoch
  • “The less conscious one is of being ‘a writer,’ the better the writing.” —Pico Iyer
  • “Writing is…that oddest of anomalies: an intimate letter to a stranger.” —Pico Iyer
  • “Writing is my dharma.” —Raja Rao
  • “Writing is a combination of intangible creative fantasy and appallingly hard work.” —Anthony Powell
  • “I think writing is, by definition, an optimistic act.” —Michael Cunningham
Current Faves - Learn more about poets featured frequently on the show