Monthly Archives: August 2010

In a chapter on the desirability of the writer maintaining a certain detachment, especially when describing sad characters or scenes, Madeleine L’Engle in A Circle of Quiet says this:  “All the scenes that move me deeply while I am writing them end up in the wastepaper basket.” Ye gods and little fishes! Notwithstanding that it always […]

I have a guilty little secret: I love So You Think You Can Dance.  I’ve been watching it for several years, but some of the routines in the past two seasons have left me badly shaken and, more often than not, in tears.  Although the lighthearted dances showcase the unbelievable talent of these young people, it […]

I am currently reading two books on the subject of writers and writing.  Joe Rosenblatt’s The Lunatic Muse, a book I believe should be on every Canadian Literature reading list, speaks to  how the poet is driven to kick open the doors of polite convention that they might admit and commune with their own demons and lay bare the dark side […]

Mary Ann Mulhern and I are working on plans for a joint reading here in Amherstburg sometime around Halloween.  Mary Ann’s new book (her fourth!) is entitled Sleeping with Satan, Salem Witch-hunt 1692, and since Halloween is the time we traditionally think of “witches” as well as being the Eve of All Saints, we thought […]