Teacher and Author
A Few of the Lessons Learned: Write for yourself; revise for your reader Trust your material: don’t pretty it up or gussy it up On craft of writing: every time something gets easier, something else gets harder Nothing is ever … Continued
Shirley Eastham’s imagination had caught fire. “Banners streamed in my blood. Drums beat in my brain. Bugles sounded in my ears,” as she wrote in her memoir twenty years after the fact. She had determined to go to France as … Continued
Before Woody Guthrie strummed out his version of “Hobo’s Lullaby,” he had probably seen–and laughed at–Will Rogers’s lovable tramp, Jubilo, in the movies. As an older teenager, he had likely heard–and was moved by–Rogers’s words on the radio: “The only … Continued
Woody Guthrie lost his older sister when he was not yet seven years old. Clara should have been at school taking final exams, but her mother insisted she stay home to do the ironing. Mid-morning, Clara burst out of the … Continued
What fun! I got to hear my table mate, Gary Buettner, make his pitch for a middle grade book about a girl caring for Dracula’s kitty. I made my own passionate case for a book about a foot race from … Continued
“To whom much is given, from him much is expected.” Or her. Much was given to Julia Stimson (born to privilege in Worcester, Massachusetts, in 1881) and much was expected. (Hers was a family whose history of public service extended … Continued