This Blog's Purpose

This blog has a purpose. I need to get back into writing and I haven't written anything longer than a paragraph in at least a year. Where have I been? Hibernating, I suppose. I feel as though I've been put on ice intellectually speaking. I've stalled in my development. It's as if since I had all that trouble in grad school and I shut down to protect myself.

In the meantime, I've been reading like crazy. I've read tons of books, graphic novels, comic books and editorials. I've tackled some of the big hitters of the literary canon like Moll Flanders, Moby Dick and Anna Karenina. I've explored how the authors of these works created multidimensional, dynamic characters. I've learned about crafting extended metaphors like Melville's white whale and to explore social and philosophical topics through subtle family dynamics.

I've also fallen in love with more contemporary writers like Richard Yates and Norman Mailer and Philip Roth. These artists are masters at making good stories from the banalities of modern life. And of courses there's my ever present love of everything John Steinbeck. He reminds me to always keep compassion and concern for people in unfortunate circumstances in the forefront of my ideas for writing.

This is all very big talk for someone who hasn't written anything at all lately. I know that, but I've got to start somewhere and laying out my ideas, influences and literary ambitions seems like as good a place to start as any. I said earlier that I'd stalled in my intellectual development. I suppose that isn't true. It certainly feels as if I've stalled, but ideas have been gestating, bouncing around in my head, looking for a way out onto paper.

These ideas need somewhere to go and this blog will fill that role. I envision several types of entries appearing in this blog. First there's going to be space here for me to practice writing fiction. Probably none of it will be great yet ,or even well edited, but it will be here and give me opportunity to practice the craft. Second, there will be reviews of books I've read. Looking at how other people practice the craft and practicing it more by writing about it can only be helpful. Third, there will be some political commentary. Good literature aims at the truths of human existence and necessarily has theoretical ideas about the relationships of people to one another and to society and this is loosely what I'm referring to as "politics." Fourth, there is going to be to be a certain amount of writing about the banalities of my own life. I may write some posts about what I had for dinner. Don't like it? Don't read it. I'm getting words onto the page and that's what I feel is most important right now.

Sure, I want people to read my writing and comment on it. But it's more important that I write something than I worry if people are going to like what I write here. That type of worrying comes later in the process and I'm just not there yet.

So, by all means, offer me encouragement on my journey. I have a long way to go and I can use all the help I can get.