Recently in Writing Category

I attended a great session at the 2010 VA Fest of the Book on the business of reviewing books. C-Span's Book TV recorded it. I just recently watched it again, after receiving some very nice comments about the question I asked (Is it appropriate to thank a reviewer? - some said "yes," others "absolutely not"). I was in the audience, though, not part of the program and found it to be awesome -- insightful, entertaining, inspiring, and surprisingly funny. I recommend it. The panelists, from left to right if you watch the video were: Rebecca Skloot, reviewer and also author of The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks; Bethanne Patrick, of The Book Studio; Ron Charles of The Washington Post Book World; Katharine Weber, review and author of True Confections; David Montgomery, reviewer for the Chicago Sun-Times and The Daily Beast and author of Thriller 2. The moderator was Bella Stander, of Book Promotion 101.

If most people don't get the biblical references, why do the creators of popular tv, movies, music and lit still use them so much? Pondering this question over iced tea with a novelist, Ph.D.-candidate friend, we decided: it's tough to say. Here are a couple of ideas that we bounced around: 

1) Audiences do recognize the biblical language, themes or characters and that's enough because the Bible continues to resonate or at least suggest something greater than what immediatley meets the eye.

2) The creators know that only a few people are going to know the reference but think, "Who cares? We know it's in there. It's cool and adds levels of meaning that are super-rich. The minority who pick up on it are going to love it."

3) It keeps people like me in business. Ok, no. That's definitely not their reason... and it's hardly a business for me. But I do love catching those biblical references, contemplating how the creators integrated and interpreted them, and what that means for the greater story or art.

What do you think is the explanation?

Living as a nomad, it was bound to happen: I left my computer behind. Bouncing between cities (two) and offices (four) as I've done the past semester, I rely on THE LIST -- things to do before leaving the house (empty the kitchen compost, e.g.) and things to bring (er, that'd be the computer, e.g.). The list works great... if I actually use it. Last week, I didn't. The irony is, I'm finally settling in again, finally staying put  -- one city, one office, for the most part, anyway. Maybe that was it. I let my guard down, got cocky.

"Remember." The Bible is full of commands to remember. It is itself a testimony of remembrance, a witness to the power of memory, and its commands humanize with their instructions. Of hospitality and kindness, "Remember that you also were foreigners, strangers in a strange land." Of faith and community, "Do this in remembrance of me." To recognize the sacred and sanctify the ordinary, "Remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy."

Being without my computer, the days were different, slower. I wrote by hand, read huge chunks of books for ideas and a big-picture sensibility (rather than recording with detailed notes). Thanks to Audubon, I identified a pair of green herons and watched as Beverly, a large almost black beaver, munched the mini maples around the periphery of the pond out back. I cleared bamboo and braised local lamb shanks. I spent time with the ones I love -- two- and four-leggeds alike. 

Then it was Memorial Day. Dinner with new friends and the invitation to share gratitude. Thanks for this place, these people, the food. But thanks, too, for the ones who have gone before. Honor to their memory -- those who have sacrificed in our armed services, yes, but also to those ordinary and extraordinary individuals whose lives, vision, and selves helped shape the ideas, conditions and company I enjoy today. My great aunt Lucille, Thomas Jefferson, those who fought to ban DDT, Louis Pasteur, my boyfriend's father.

Truth is, I have a terrible memory. I want to remember that as I age so that I don't worry unnecessarily about my forgetting. But, well, you see the problem there. Maybe, though, forgetting can lead, as in the case of my computer, to different kinds of remembering. Deeper remembrances -- of our tiny-ness, of our dependence on and debts to others, of what is holy. Now where did I put those keys?

Heading south to Petersburg (VA)'s Life through Lit Fest. It's a book lovin' day to spend in the park. Live music, free books, author chats, and yes funnel cakes. Come if you can (noon-7pm in Poplar Lawn Park)! It'd be fun to see you there~

 Summer came flying into Virginia this year. Just last week, I was scraping frost off the windshield, and today they predict highs near 90, even in Charlottesville. So last evening, as we in the Commonwealth rotated away from the sun, I gave some serious thought to hanging out in the hammock or maybe paddling up Ivy Creek. But at the Nature Center not half a mile away, Rebecca Solnit was visiting from San Francisco and scheduled to read a bit from her recent work. At the last minute, I trundled up there and found myself nodding like a dashboard bobble-head as she read about houses, about public and private spaces, about desire, imagination, and the ways we get and spend.
 Years ago, a provocative phrase took hold of me and keeps nagging for attention: "smaller houses, bigger homes."

Wonderful to see so many people at the Charlottesville Barnes and Noble last Wed eve! As moderator David Bearinger noted, Winn Collier's Holy Curiosity and my Bible Babel are very different projects, though both concern the Bible. The Virginia Festival of the Book (a Virginia Foundation for the Humanities event) has included panels on religion and spirituality in the past but not specifically on the Good Book. The conversation and questions reflected well the two ways that Winn and I worked with the Bible in our books -- confessional and informational -- and pushed each of us to think and talk about the other. After all, one cannot assume a confessional position without reflecting intellectually, even if just to read and interpret, the text, on the one hand. On the other hand, any academic treatment of the Bible is still treatment of a religious and sacred text, which inevitably draws the investigator into the world of spirituality, even if only to think about how that text has affected and informed the faith of others. Thanks to all who attended!

The Virginia Festival of the Book kicks off today, St. Patty's Day! I'm on for a Bible Babel book talk tonight -- 6pm at the Charlottesville Barnes and Noble on Emmett. If you're in the area, do come! I had a chance to visit over coffee yesterday with my fellow panelist, Winn Collier, and our charming and insightful moderator, David Bearinger. I think it's going to be great fun. The Virginia Foundation for the Humanities has been putting on this remarkable event for years. You can check out the line-up for each day (it goes through Saturday) by following the link above. Hope to see you there!

I was delighted to read Pulitzer-prize winner Michael Dirda's review of Bible Babel in the Washington Post last week. He clearly read the book carefully through, and "got" it. That he liked it, too -- how sweet! Meanwhile, check out some of Dirda's own books, if you haven't had the pleasure already. As an avid collector of quotes -- inspiring, intriguing, comforting, and unsettling -- I especially love Dirda's Book by Book, containing such gems gleaned from Dirda's wide-ranging reading and organized with a bit of engaging commentary by the author himself.

A hot summer day, slow river, cooler of bevs, swimsuit, and a few good friends -- ingredients for a lazy day of tubing. At least that's what "tubing" brings to mind around here in Richmond. Drinking, chatting, napping your way through an afternoon on the James in July. In cold weather places, tubing is a winter thing, too. But qualitatively different. You take that great big inner tube like the ones that go inside semi-truck tires, hike it up an icy hill, climb inside, and with a push, commit yourself to fate. Bouncing, whooshing, and careening down the hill, tubing inevitably sends someone to the hospital. The responses I've received from posting my interview with Virginia Currents host May-Lily Lee to Youtube some time ago have been a little like winter tubing. Most were really fun responses and exchanges with people interested in the stuff of Bible Babel, but there was also a great krr-smash(!) -- inevitable, I suppose, when dealing with the Bible. In the interview itself, I got a bit brain-and-tongue twisted at one point. Meaning to note how ancient the biblical texts are, but recognizing that they don't all date to the same ancient period, I fumbled around for "...years ago." I suspect that was where the trouble started, sort of like hitting a tree root that sent me barrelling against a guy who totally misunderstood me. The especially bonkers part of it is that he was furious with me for exactly the opposite of what I think or do. He thought that I was taking particular biblical texts and plopping them down in our time and place as immediately applicable, with no appreciation for their ancient historical or literary context... oh, and that I think I have all the answers. If only I did! But I know that I don't. Besides, I love the questions, the conversation and multi-faceted interpretations. That's where it's at. And when it comes to talking about the Bible, there's no clean slate. Everyone's got a "take" of some sort on it, so we trudge our tubes back up the hill for another wild ride. 

Huge snow in VA, cold days clear down to FL, these are the days for books. Any form, any genre, grab a fav or something new and settle in.   Want something fun to share with family gathered over the holidays? Or maybe you need a break from the mayhem. Perhaps you're going solo this year and feeling a little blue or happily free(!) ... books. Gotta love 'em. Need some ideas? Check out this bibliophile website , culled from Don Swaim's CBS radio show, "Book Beat," where you can listen to great writers talk about their books, the craft, life, in brief segments. There are countless books featured in the line-up. Find one to suit your taste, hunker down, and be transported.