Friday

Aug. 22, 1997

Words

by Catherine Fisher

FRIDAY 8/22

Today's Reading: "Words" by Catherine Fisher from THE UNEXPLORED OCEAN, published by Poetry Wales Press (1994).

The Alaska State Fair starts today in Palmer, Alaska.

The conflict in Viet Nam began in 1945 when a team of Free French parachuted into southern Indo-China, in response to a successful coup by Communist guerrilla Ho Chi Minh.

Writer E. Annie Proulx (POSTCARDS; THE SHIPPING NEWS), was born in Norwich, Connecticut, in 1935.

Science-fiction writer Ray Bradbury (THE MARTIAN CHRONICLES; FAHRENHEIT 451) was born in Waukegan, Illinois, in 1920.

Blues singer John Lee Hooker was born in Clarksdale, Mississippi, in 1917.

Leonardo da Vinci's painting, MONA LISA, was stolen from the Louvre in Paris by an angry Italian house painter in 1911.

Photographer Henri Cartier-Bresson was born in Chanteloup, France, in 1908.

Writer and humorist Dorothy Parker, one of the founders of the Algonquin Round Table, was born in West End, New Jersey, in 1893.

Sculptor Jacques Lipchitz, who fled the Nazis in France and arrived in New York with just $20 to his name, was born in Druskieniki, Lithuania, in 1891.

Cartoonist George Herriman, creator of the KRAZY KAT strip, was born in New Orleans in 1880.

The inventor of the pressure cooker, Denis Papin, was born in Blois, France, in 1647.

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