“Creative-writing programs are designed on the theory that students who have never published a poem can teach other students who have never published a poem how to write a publishable poem.”

So writes Louis Menand in his article Show Or Tell, in the June 8 & 15 edition of the New Yorker. His article takes a broad approach to tackling the question: Should creative writing be taught?

Or, CAN creative writing be taught? Everyone has his or her own answer here. I’ll show you mine if you show me yours.

As some of you know, I’m what might be considered a “product” of an MFA program (makes me feel like I’m a can of green beans). I’ve participated in and even lead workshops to help other beans (er, writers) improve. And I admit, even though I paid an amount of money that shall not be specified here, I am a bit skeptical of workshops and of teaching creative writing.

 My interest in getting an MFA was only in part to improve my craft. The rest of it had to do with a) seeking opportunities and meeting awesome people, b) getting a degree so I could teach, c) having a good excuse to concentrate entirely on my work, and write, write, write.

Do I think you can teach writing? Sure. Basic technique? You bet.

Can you teach creativity? Sure, to a certain extent.

But for me, it’s the overlap–the shifting, elusive, unnamed interaction between creativity and writing–that just can’t be pinned down or taught.

Here’s a few more quotes of interest:

“Harvard once considered hiring Nabokov to teach literature; Roman Jackson, then a professor of linguistics there, is supposed to have asked whether the university was also prepared to hire an elephant to teach zoology.”

“What is usually said is that you can’t teach inspiration, but you can teach craft.”

Wallace Stegner says  ”a work of art is not a gem, as some schools of criticism would insist, but truly a lens. We look through it for the purified and honestly offered spirit of the artist.”

“Teachers are the books that students read most closely, and this is especially true in the case of teachers who are living models for exactly what the student aspires one day to be-a published writer.”

What do you think? Can creative writing be taught? Leave your thoughts, and win a chance to pick anything you want from my LOVE TO READERS page.

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I’m sitting at my kitchen table, battling a bit of a headache and fighting off eye strain, but there’s a thunderstorm rolling in, and I LOVE thunderstorms, so overall it’s a good evening so far. I hope that wherever you are as you’re reading this, you’re having a nice moment too!

OLD BUSINESS: I had my book signing at The Fine Grind this weekend, as you know, and it was a ton of fun! Congrats to Kris for winning the raffle prize (a book/box and Fine Grind mug!). Here’s a picture of the little cutie who did the honors of picking the winner. Oh…and here’s me too, for those of you who couldn’t be there. It’s a terrible picture, but I really wanted you to be able to see the pretty sunflowers in the front. A friend brought chocolate in the shape of sunflowers to match the book cover! How adorable is that?

I also sat on a panel at BooksNJ this weekend with Debra Borden and DeLaune Michel. The festival was wonderful and I’m looking forward to reading books by both authors! The Bergen County Library volunteers did an amazing job.

NEW BUSINESS: Today, I read a really fascinating piece of writing. I was totally captivated and puzzled and amused. Believe it or not, the bit of text I’m referring to actually came by way of a spammer! The poem below was created by either a spam robot or a space alien (I’d like to think I’m receiving messages from the latter). Obviously the “poem” below makes no sense. But some of the word combos are fascinating. Accidental poetry where you least expect it. I just had to share! I put my favorite ones in red.

aerate module.
morgue bingo.
sell voter.
valuer nopal shrink gasper!
ragout scamp graft.
tempi bay.
lumper elan smelt peso?
lives voter swathe pawn?
fully public gooey scamp?
seer fully.
gas smelt pupa.
oakery flood.
bounty outre cooker sell.
tare tempi gas glover!
nopal gird pupa give?
sin ingle.
pupa valuer.
cashew novel smelt valuer.
feed palmy graft tandem.
elan gird aerate swathe!
pawn chalk.
warble find tare elan!
bled coatee warble.
bay lumper.

Like one of these word combinations? Seen any random poetry today? Stories welcome.

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Hi fearless readers! 

So, I’m toying with the idea of writing my new book “about” a coffee shop, so I’ve been doing a lot of research about it. I used to work at a café (I loved it) in Little Falls, NJ. Actually, I’m doing a book signing there this weekend. I do know a thing or two about getting my hands dirty when it comes to coffee. But I didn’t know too much about the history of the drink.

Anyway, I wanted to share some of my notes with you because I learned some AMAZING things about coffee. I read Stewart Lee Allen’s The Devil’s Cup. Part travel narrative, part text book, it was a really fun read that I’d highly recommend if you’re into coffee.

I picked up some really fascinating facts. For example, Do you know where the word cappuccino comes from?  According to this book, one day the spirit of St. Francis visited a monk named Matteo. The Saint was wearing a peaked hood, different from what other monks wore at the time. So Matteo decided to wear the same hat as St. Francis. But the other Franciscans got jealous that they didn’t have peaked hoods and they threw Matteo in a dungeon. It got so heated the Pope stepped in and said Matteo could have his own order: That Capuchins, from cap meaning, uh, cap. The brown of the cappuccino is supposed to be the same brown as those original robes. And that hat part has something to do with a cap of foam. Am I the only one who thinks that’s amazing?

And I couldn’t write this post without including this insane moment in coffee history. Apparently, the women of London got fed up with their men drinking coffee in the late 17^th century. Even though caffeine is a stimulant, the women were complaining that they could not get their men…uh…stimulated. So they decided to fight the coffee machine and petition the mayor of London to ban coffee. Here’s what they wrote:

That since ’tis Reckon’d amongst the Glories of our native Country To be A paradise for women, it is too unspeakable Grief we find of late that our gallants are become mere Cock-sparrows, fluttering things that come on with a world of Fury but in the very first Charge fall down Flat before us…all these qualities we can Attribute to nothing more than excessive use of the most pernicious Coffee, where Nature is Enfeebled and our men left with Ammunition Wanting; peradventure they Present but cannot give Fire…Certainly our Countrymen’s palettes are become as Fanatical as their Brains. How else is it possible they should run a Fanatical as their Brains. How else is it possible they should run a Whoreing to spend the money and time on a little base, black thick, nasty, Bitter, Stinking, Nauseous, Puddle-water (also known as Ninny’s Broth and Turkish Gruel), so that those that have scarce two pence to buy their children bread must spend a penny each evening in this insipid stuff…

Wherefore we pray that drinking COFFEE be forbidden to all Persons under the Age of Threescore and that Lusty Nappy Beer and Cock Ale (my note: a kind of old Viagra) be Recommended to General use…so that our Husbands may (in time) give us some other Testimonies of the being Men, besides their Beards, and that they no more shall run the hazard of being Cuckol’d by Dildos.

Is it just me or does that whole thing seem like their complaint is less about coffee than it is about their husbands sleeping around?

Those of you who are squeamish, turn away now. Because I’m about to tell you about “monkey coffee.” Monkey coffee actually comes from an Indonesia creature called the palm toddy cat. The cat supposedly eats only the best coffee beans and also dines on alcoholic tree sap. The coffee beans go through a kind of chemical reaction in its intestines. When the beans come out, they’re washed and sold for hundreds dollars a pound. Blech…

So now that I’ve delighted you with my research…I’m off to grab a cup of joe (named for an admiral who encouraged the drinking of coffee to make his soldiers more vigorous).

Ciao!

Reader Questions: Do you drink coffee? What are your caffeine habits?

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It’s Thursday evening, and it’s been a very busy week as you can imagine. I’ve barely had time to check my e-mail in a few days since I’m in the middle of going over edits for It Happened One Night. But I want to thank everyone for your warm, wonderful, kind comments! I hope I can give all the good cheer that you give me back to you!

As promised, I wanted to announce the randomly chosen winner of May’s comment contest. Each time you leave a comment on this blog, it earns you a chance to pick whatever PRIZE you want from my LOVE TO READERS page.

And May’s random winner is…cheryl c!!

Cheryl–you can pick whatever you want from my love to readers page! Just e-mail me (lisa @ lisadalebooks.com) with your physical address and e-mail addy!

Cheryl c won because she congratulated the winner of my book cover contest! When you give good will, you get it back! So keep those comments coming!

Best wishes!

Lisa Dale

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As some of you know, my boyfriend Matt proposed to me (!) while we were on vacation last week, and, of course, I said yes.

I thought it might be fun to write about it here because Matt’s proposal was one of the most beautiful, perfect moments of my life, so wonderful that I want to share it with everyone. What a dazzling blessing. I’ve been walking around like a kid at Christmas, only a bazillion times better.

In February, Matt told me that he wanted to go on vacation. We’re on a pretty tight budget, but when Matt gets something into his head–that’s it. There’s no arguing. Luckily he’s a reasonable guy, so I figured if he wanted a vacation, who was I to say no go?

So he booked us a flight to Tampa and then, over the course of the next few weeks, researched hotels and things to do. I, on the other hand, worked my tail off with my writing. Honestly, I didn’t know how I’d be able to go on vacation because I have so much work to do.  But since not knowing if you have time for vacation is usually a pretty good sign that you need one, off we went.

The hotel was amazing-a six-star resort called The Vinoy. The building is a restored 1920s, Mediterranean-style revival. Took my breath away.  I should have suspected something, but Matt has very fine tastes, so I didn’t really consider that this was an unusual trip. I am obviously a little dense.

Below are some pictures of the hotel.  The lobby was amazing, and in the evening people walked around in cocktail dresses and jackets, just because. I ate my breakfast on a veranda just as a thunderstorm was coming in. I LOVE thunderstorms. It rocked.

The night we arrived, Matt suggested we go to dinner; he found a gem of a restaurant: a local favorite. I put on a really cute sundress-one of my faves.  I’m so glad I did!

We went to walk on a beach called Pass-a-grille before dinner.  Pictures below.  The sun was setting and the sky was a mellow blue. The air was warm but not hot, and the beach was nearly empty. We took off our shoes and decided to walk in the surf, which was cool and refreshing.

Everything just seemed lifted up, like normal life but taken to a surreal, more beautiful and even holy place. But it wasn’t unusual exactly. Instead it was as if all extraneous distractions had been stripped away, and the usual beauty of everyday life was showing through. I felt so very taken care of–as if the whole universe had aligned to create the moment. And that was before I turned around and saw that Matt had stopped walking. Before I heard him say, “You know I want to spend the rest of my life with you.”

Matt had been asking me to stop walking for about a minute, but I’d been having such a good time that I’d said “What are you nuts?” I could have walked in the water forever. And because he couldn’t get me to move away from the surf, he went down on one knee right there in the water, in his nice pants and with his beautiful leather shoes getting washed up the beach by a wave.

I’ll be honest. I didn’t even look at the ring.

“Will you marry me?” he asked.

And I said, “Yes, yes! But only if you stand up!”

Not my most eloquent moment. But still, perfect. And it occurred to me how different real life is from movies, when–during a Hollywood marriage proposal–the seconds seem so crystalline and drawn-out, and the heroine knows just what to say and the most poignant way to say it. Instead I felt so overcome by the momentous beauty and importance of the moment, I could barely register it. All I wanted to do was say yes.

So, below you’ll find a slide show of some pictures taken at the hotel and just before and after Matt proposed.

Matt and I have been together for over eight years now, so when people ask if we have a date set yet, I tell them we don’t want to rush into anything drastic. But the truth is, if I could plan a wedding in a week, I would.

If you want to tell me your engagement stories–or your friends’–I’d love to hear them. And I’ll be picking last month’s “comment” winner for my next post, but I just couldn’t wait to share my news first!

Best and love,

Lisa 

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You know that feeling you get when you’re reading a book, and you’re so deeply involved in the story that you lose track of the real world–your surroundings, sounds, time, your own body, everything?

I’ve wondered for a very long time, What exactly is it that makes us get absorbed by a story? What is escapism, physically?

It feels like magic but logically I know it’s science (although, are they really far apart?). How is it that we readers can find such vivid, real, nearly physical experiences from sitting still reading a book?

Oddly enough, I stumbled across part of the answer in a book called Buyology: The Truth And Lies About Why We Buy, by Martin Lindstrom.

Here’s what Martin has to say about what happens to our brains when we’re reading.

Recently, a team of researchers at UCLA used an fMRI to scan subjects’ brains while they read phrases that described a host of actions like “biting a peach” and “grasping a pen.” Later, when the same subjects observed videos of people performing these same two simple actions, the identical cortical regions of the brains lit up. If I simply write the words “nails scratching on a chalkboard” or “sucking on a lemon” or “giant hairy black widow spider,” chances are good that you’ll wince, recoil or otherwise squirm while reading them (your mind visualizes that painful sound, the bitter taste of the lemon wedge, those furry legs edging along your calf). Those are your mirror neurons at work…According to the results of one fMRI study, “When we read a book, these specialized cells respond as if we are actually doing what the book character is doing.” –page 58

How awesome is that? So even if we’re not eating a peach, our brain fires up as if we are. It explains so much about how easy it is to feel as if what we’re reading is really happening.

Some people say that readers have an extra strong ability to empathize with other people because of the mirror neuron effect–because we can live other people’s experiences through books. I don’t know if I buy the “extra strong ability” bit, but I do think mirror neurons teach me a lot about emotion when I read. And suddenly it makes a little more sense as to how I can feel so swallowed up by a book sometimes.

Isn’t it miraculous that our biology allows for us to escape into distant worlds through nothing more than some squiggly lines on a page? Somehow, escapism seems no less mysterious even if you know how it works.

When did you last feel lost in a book? What happened?

Leave a comment and automatically enter to win a monthly drawing to pick any gift you like from here: http://bookanatomy101.com/love-to-readers/

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Thanks so much to all you awesome people who entered the contest to celebrate my new book! I’m leaving tomorrow at 4 a.m. for a quick trip down to the Sunshine State, so I have to keep this super brief (in theory, I’m going to bed soon). Please forgive typos.

First off, let me just say how wonderful your captions and comments were. You really made this last couple days a lot of fun for me, so thanks so much! I’ve been walking around smiling like a goober thanks to you all. These comments are funny, poignant, witty, silly, smart, heartfelt, touching, and full of joy. Those of you who haven’t seen all the creative captions people came up with, it really is worth your time to click here: http://bookanatomy101.com/2009/05/new-book-cover-contest/#comments.

Don’t forget: anyone who comments on this blog is automatically entered into a monthly drawing to pick a gift from my Love to Readers page. So do  keep sharing your great thoughts. Each comment gets you another chance to win!

And the winner is…

I’ve employed a very random and scientific method to objectively determine the winner of the contest (it involved shouting to the other room, “hey, Matt. Matt! Pick a random number!”).

And after essentially no deliberation, I’d like to announce that the winner is the 21st person who left a comment…and that is…me. Shoot.

Hold on, let’s try this again.

And the winner is…#7! Congratulations to Julie Achterhoff. Julie, if I don’t hear from you, I’ll do my best to track you down.

 And finally, a special cover comment from my friend Michael:

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Hi All!

I’m having a contest to celebrate the COVER ART for my new book. As many of you know IT HAPPENED ONE NIGHT comes out in November of this year. Here’s what it’s about:

(Grand Central, November 09) Lana Biel longs to leave her family’s Vermont wildflower farm so she can travel and see the world. And her sister Karin wants nothing more than to put down roots and conceive the child she and her husband just can’t seem to have. When a lighthearted fling with a mountain biker leaves Lana expecting, she finds herself tumbling headlong into motherhood while her sister Karin can only look on.

For help, Lana turns to Eli Ward, a professional meteorite hunter and her best friend for the last ten years. But Eli’s keeping secrets that could turn their friendship on its head. As the Vermont seasons change and the flowers in the wildflower meadows begin to fade, Lana must make some meaningful decisions about her family, her friendships, her love life, and her dreams.

To celebrate, I decided to have a little contest. I’ll include a picture of the new book cover below, and all you have to do is write a caption for the scene on the cover. It can be juvenile, heartfelt, silly, nice–whatever. Or, if you can’t think of a caption, just leave any comment about the cover. Let me know what you think.

Scroll down to see my new cover! Post your caption or your thoughts as a comment on this blog post!

One person will get to pick a prize from the Love To Readers section of my blog.

Leave your comments: I’d love to know what you think!

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So, it’s been kind of a downer week, disappointments all around in the work arena (rejections and whatnot). But as it turns out, the Universe has made me well-equipped to deal with the doldrums.

I came in to work this morning and a work friend had e-mailed me a very cool blog post, even though she didn’t know that I was having a bummer day. It seemed providential. Here’s the link to the original blog post. In the post, Jane Friedman, who works at Writer’s Digest, tells the story of how bummed she was that she didn’t get her perfect job at Writer’s Digest–only to get a more perfect job. Her good spirit in the face of a setback led to bigger and better things.

Here’s a few quotes from the original post:

Many of life’s failures are people who did not realize how close they were to success when they gave up.

-Thomas Edison

Making your mark on the world is hard. If it were easy, everybody would do it. But it’s not. It takes patience, it takes commitment, and it comes with plenty of failure along the way. The real test is not whether you avoid this failure, because you won’t. it’s whether you let it harden or shame you into inaction, or whether you learn from it; whether you choose to persevere.

-President Obama

Then, adding to my belief that the Universe doesn’t mean for me to be bummed out, I found this cool phrase just a few hours later:

aide-toi, le ciel t’ai·dera

French: help yourself (and) heaven will help you.

So it’s around four p.m. now and I just have this feeling that despite the ups and downs, life is generally more up. Especially now that I can sound all smart by saying aide-toi, le ciel t’ai·dera.

And never mind the irony that I just (ten minutes ago) got a rejection letter from Writer’s Digest for an article I pitched to them, even while I was planning this post. How funny is that? I decided to submit the article somewhere else instead.

It’s a weird, weird world we live in. Thank goodness for that.  

Enjoy your day today, all! Good things await. 

* Photo by sarah_azavezza.

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