“These are words I’ve lived and written by; they have allowed me to find meaning and purpose in every age, stage, experience adventure and misadventure in life. Here, I do it again, focusing on our lives, mine and yours, as writers. I give some advice; I tell some stories.
"Thanks for the title, Maurice.”
THERE IS NOTHING MORE SOLITARY THAN THE ACT OF WRITING. YET, NO WORK MAKES IT TO PUBLICATION IN SOLITUDE. MY LATE MOTHER’S LAST BIRTHDAY BROUGHT THIS HOME TO ME. THRIVING IN THIS SOLITARY PROFESSION TURNS OUT TO REQUIRE AN ECOSYSTEM. HERE’S HOW TO GROW YOURS. We celebrated my mother’s 97th birthday, her next-to-last, on the front porch of the home… Read More
“CLOUDS IN MY COFFEE.” I’M SURE I DIDN’T HAVE TO SAY ANY MORE THAN THAT TO FIND YOU SINGING CARLY SIMON’S, “YOU’RE SO VAIN.” THE STORY OF HOW THAT SONG GOT WRITTEN IS HOW EVERYTHING GETS WRITTEN. Remember “You’re So Vain” by Carly Simon? There’s an apocryphal story about it. Decades ago Simon was flying across country to New York… Read More
MOTHER’S DAY, IN ITS INSISTENCE ON SENTIMENT AND BIOLOGY, IS CRUEL TO MANY. AND IT’S REDUCTIVE TO ALL OF US. INCLUDING THOSE OF US WHO STILL HAVE MOTHERS, AND LOVE THEM. INCLUDING THOSE WHO ARE THEMSELVES LOVING, LOVABLE MOTHERS. BUT BEING A MOTHER, AND HAVING A MOTHER , EVEN WHEN IT WORKS BEAUTIFULLY, IS NEVER AS SIMPLE AS A MUG… Read More
WRITING TAUGHT ME ABOUT WHAT IT TAKES TO WORK OUT. WORKING OUT TAUGHT ME ABOUT WHAT IT TAKES TO WRITE. AND IT TURNS OUT YOU WRITE, OR WORK OUT, IN YOUR MID-SIXTIES, EXACTLY THE SAME WAY YOU ALWAYS DID. AND YOU HAVE TO KEEP LEARNING THIS. THIS TIME AROUND, A FUNKY SHOULDER, A VERY OLD CAT, AMY TAM, AND A… Read More
SOMETIMES YOU THINK YOU KNOW WHAT’S GOING TO HAPPEN. YOU’RE USUALLY WRONG. AND THAT’S PROBABLY NOT A BAD THING. I used to teach in a program called Artists-in-Schools, as did my longtime friend, musician Bill Haymes. I’d come into schools, a visiting writer helping students (sometimes very young, sometimes teenagers) write. Bill did the same, but with music and song-writing…. Read More
A PERSON HAS A LIFE, WITH A DEFINITE AND IRREFUTABLE BEGINNING, MIDDLE, AND END. BUT, WITH A BOOK IT’S NOT SO CLEAR. I spent a recent Sunday, improbably, working on an introduction to the forthcoming Chinese edition of a children’s book entitled Sleepy Book. Written in 1956 or ’57 and published in 1958, its author is Charlotte Zolotow, my late mother…. Read More
SOMETIMES YOU JUST DON’T KNOW HOW IT’S GOING TO COME OUT. OR EVEN IF IT WILL. BUT IF YOU HANG IN THERE ANYWAY, TRANSFORMATION IS POSSIBLE. IN FACT, IT MIGHT BE ON ITS WAY TO YOU RIGHT NOW, HERE’S WHAT MY EDGY, ALCOHOLIC, WRITER FATHER – WHO LATER SOBERED UP – TAUGHT ME ABOUT THIS. About three years ago, a… Read More
How do people get good at things? Especially, those people who are astoundingly good at what they do — how on earth do they get that way? No matter who your favorite musicians are (or writers, athletes, actors, artists, cooks), , you can bet they do three things. These are things that anyone, who is good at anything, does, regardless of what… Read More
HOW DO WE BECOME LOVABLE, AS IN, ABLE TO GIVE AND RECEIVE LOVE? SOMETIMES, WE LEARN FROM CATS. OR A CAT, PARTICULARLY BELOVED. IN MY CASE, THAT WAS BEANBLOSSOM. The other morning, I was making breakfast. I cracked two eggs for an omelette, into a small stainless steel bowl. Beating them with a fork, hearing that distinctive musical rhythmic metal-on-metal clang,… Read More
I blame, or credit, Carol Gaddy. She heard me reading poetry between sets of a bluegrass band at a now-defunct nightclub in Eureka Springs, Arkansas. If you are silly enough to attempt such a reading, you will find your poetry greatly improved by the endeavor. The feedback is like no other: if one single phrase isn’t smacking your audience upside… Read More
“Daddy,” I said admiringly, “You should run for president.” I was six. Sitting on the dirty clothes hamper in the bathroom, my back to the window, watching him shave late one afternoon. He stood, in his white boxers, facing the mirrored white medicine cabinet. At that time, he was a Broadway critic, and if he was going out to an… Read More
November, the month that begins with the syllable “No.” And this year, in 2016, the month when more than half of the Americans who voted woke up to discover the country in which they lived was not the one in which they thought they lived. What is there to say yes to in November, particularly this one? *** On the… Read More
“My late father, Maurice Zolotow, was a Hollywood biographer, a professional freelance writer and passionate reader. Whenever I went through hard times, personally or professionally, Maurice could be counted on to tell me two things. The first was advice: ‘Write your way out of it!’ he’d bark, directively. But then, more thoughtfully, he’d say, ‘It’s all material, Cres. Nothing is wasted on the writer.’
