• Home
  • about
    • blog
      • Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer
      • #DinnerwithDragonwagon
      • Deep Feast
      • #WidowhoodWednesday
    • media: interviews / profiles / articles
    • radio / video
    • cookbooks
    • publications list
  • books
    • children’s books
    • novels / fiction
    • poetry
    • reviews of CD’s books
  • Mentoring
    • testimonials
  • contact
  • “Is that your real name?”
    • Subscribe
  • FEARLESS WRITING™ 2023

Crescent Dragonwagon

“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.’

“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.”

whimper while you work: life-density, writing, very dark chocolate

By Crescent Dragonwagon

First, let me say how humiliated I am that I haven’t done a new blog post since (OH my GOD, this is ETERNITY in Blogland!) … since last July.  Actually, I did do one. It was, juicily, about older babes who are still sex-positive in their late 50’s and onward, sometimes way onward. I number myself, gladly, among this group,… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer Tagged With: appreciation, Arkansas, bittersweet, Burdick, cats, chocolate, cooking, Crescent dragonwagon, culinary writing, Dairy Hollow House, Double-Density, Double-Density Chocolate-Walnut Torte, Eureka Springs, Food and Drink, Hillary Clinton, Barack Obama, innkeeping, Ned Shank, peace, practice makes practice, sex after 50, 60. 70, sexuality, writer's memory, writers, writing, writing practice, writing process

that blog about Ned’s penis

By Crescent Dragonwagon

I'd never met Raven Mardirosian before she read tarot cards for me, one gray November day last year in Bellows Falls, Vermont. But it turned out she had met me. Sort of Raven, whose winglike swath of hair is dark and shiny as her namesake, made tea. We settled down into a large velveteen couch in the eclectic Victorian living… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer Tagged With: aging

when the wind stops

By Crescent Dragonwagon

The last thing I should have been doing that day was cleaning. It was a Monday in early spring. I was getting ready to travel the following Saturday. Travel, from this isolated spot in Vermont, is as segmented as a centipede. First, you drive an hour and 50 minutes from home to the airport nearest us (BDL, at Hartford, Connecticut)…. Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized

dreaming, as winer holds spring: “rare hare of hope”, part two

By Crescent Dragonwagon

I write these words on Easter, that holiday which represents a triumphant  e resurrection. It  also coincides, at least here in Northeast America, with the resurrection of the year itself. The seasonal clock ticks loudly, rousing nature audibly from the deep sleep of winter (which, in Vermont and points north, looks so like death, but, of course, isn't), and into… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized

II

By Crescent Dragonwagon

: Now why David, a documentary filmmaker once nominated for an Academy Award (for the film People of the Wind), decided to take on this job was a bit mysterious to me, but in  seven years with the man, I've come to accept that I don't have to understand his decisions to admire the enthusiasm and dedication with which he… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized

2010: this is the year you write your memoir

By Crescent Dragonwagon

Will 2010 be the year you write your memoir? Yes — if you take “This is the Year You Write Your Memoir” , an extended 12-session course (3 day-long workshops; 9 3-hour evening classes) and if you’re ready to put in the reading and writing time outside of class; probably the equivalent of 45 minutes to an hour daily, or… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized

build your writing practice

By Crescent Dragonwagon

Crescent’s new one-day workshop What’s a writing practice? Practice makes practice. No calling or enterprise worthy of the name is ever perfected or learned just once.“A writing practice” means that you make writing a regular part of your life. That simple; that complex.  Whether  you are just beginning to write or undertaking your first (or fifteenth) novel, whether you write… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized Tagged With: building a writing practice, Crescent dragonwagon, journal, journaling, write, writer's block, writers self-discipline, writing, writing practice, writing prompts, writing workshops

Redecoration, Part Two: Flambe

By Crescent Dragonwagon

Sometimes, I swear I can still smell the smoke. Exactly two months and seventeen days after I became the legal owner of the farm, its kitchen exploded. On the face of it, this might be a humiliating thing for a cookbook author to confess, let alone one who also once set her hair on fire during a cooking demonstration (accidentally,… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized

nixing the f-word:

By Crescent Dragonwagon

I like the kind of menus where ingredients are sourced. You know, "Salad of Hill Farm Limestone Lettuce with Iowa Maytag Blue-Cheese, Terra Ranch Scallions & Peaches, Sonoma County Olive Oil & Meyer Lemon." I have been known to drive twenty miles, or walk twenty blocks, out of my way to eat at a Persian or vegetarian restaurant, or even… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized

ABOUT FEARLESS WRITING™ WITH CRESCENT DRAGONWAGON

ABOUT FEARLESS WRITING™ WITH CRESCENT DRAGONWAGON

By Crescent Dragonwagon

Crescent Dragonwagon’s Fearless Writing™ is for working writers, and writers who are “blocked”, would-be, or just-starting-out.  It’s even for many people who may not think of themselves as writers… yet. As writers and as humans, we all periodically find ourselves stopped. By doubt in our own abilities. By uncertainties about the direction or style of particular piece of writing (or… Read More

Filed Under: creativity, Events, Fearless Living, Fearless Writing, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, self-understanding, personal growth, Uncategorized, writing, Writing Courses

fearless alumni

By Crescent Dragonwagon

testimonials: what Fearless alumni say “Crescent Dragonwagon’s Fearless Writing course is inspiring and original. I loved it, and recommend it often and enthusiastically to both established and aspiring writers. “ — Julia Child, television personality, chef and author of Mastering the Art of French Cooking, Fearless Writing alumni (Providence, Rhode Island, 2000) * ” I entered the class certain that I… Read More

Filed Under: Crescent Dragonwagon, Nothing Is Wasted on the Writer, Uncategorized

  • « Previous Page
  • 1
  • …
  • 3
  • 4
  • 5

Read Aloud with Crescent and Mark

NOT A LITTLE MONKEY, by Charlotte Zolotow, illustrted by Michelle Chessaree

"So, the little girl climbed into the big waste-basket and waited." ' Oh no,' said her mother, ' we don't want to throw you away.'"There are many ways to express love and the need for attention. Here, a busy mother and her just-a-bit naughty little girl tease each other affectionately — the little girl making her point without even uttering a word.That's today's story time — read aloud by the author's daughter at Crescent Dragonwagon's Writing, Cooking, & Workshops, with Mark Graff's "text support" and discussion."Just right for two-to-fours, the humor of this true-to-life story of a mischievous little girl who blocks her mother's attempts to clean house will elicit giggles from the lollipop set." Kirkus Reviews

Posted by Crescent Dragonwagon's Writing, Cooking, & Workshops on Thursday, June 4, 2020

Read Aloud with Crescent

Read Aloud with Crescent

The Washington Post on Crescent’s Lentil Soup Recipe

The Washington Post on Crescent’s Lentil Soup Recipe

Greek Lentil Soup with Spinach and Lemon, photograph by Tom McCorkle, Washington Post

Bean By Bean Cookbooks

#DeepFeast Recipes

More Posts from this Category

Dinner with Dragonwagon

More Posts from this Category

 for children:

A NAPPA Gold Winner
NAPPA


"... like a warm luminescent blanket at bedtime... softly lulling." -- New York Times


"(With) weary animals, Dragonwagon offers an “alphabet of ways to sleep,” smoothly working in some alliteration..."
- Publishers Weekly (starred review)


Available at:

Crescent Dragonwagon page style=

read aloud with Crescent Dragonwagon

Until Just Moistened

Until Just Moistened

Available for Purchase

Copyright © 2023 · Darling theme by Restored 316