The Writing Life: reflections by a working writer.

The Writing Life: reflections by a working writer. The Writing Life

Reflections of a working writer, a university screenwriting professor, and the editor of Oregon Literary Review.

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Charles Deemer

Editor,
Oregon Literary Review

MFA, Playwriting, University of Oregon

Writing faculty, Portland State University (part-time)

Retired playwright and screenwriter.
Active novelist, librettist and teacher.

Email: cdeemer(at)yahoo(dot)com

The eagle flies!

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References

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Finalist, Oregon Book Award

Practical Screenwriting

Love At Ground Zero

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Blogs by (mostly) creative writers:

"Can We Talk About Me For A Change?"
Playwright Debra Neff Nathans

Inkygirl
Debbie Ridpath Ohi, a weblog for writers (resources)

Silliman's Blog
Ron Silliman, contemporary poetry and poetics

Maud Newton
literary links, amusements, politics, rants

Darren Barefoot
Technical and creative writing, theatre, Dublin

Rob's Writing Pains
Journey of a struggling writer.

Mad, Mad World
Cara Swann, fiction writer, journalist, "reflections on humanity, random news & my life."

Writeright
Random musings on a writer's life and times.

Flaskaland
Barbara Flaska's compilation of the best online articles about music and culture.

Write Of Way
Samantha Blackmon's written musings on writing (composition and rhetoric).

Alexander b. Craghead: blog
Writing, photography, and watercolors.

Rodney's Painted Pen
Rodney Bohen's daily commentary "on the wondrous two legged beast we fondly refer to as mankind." His pen runneth over.

Frustrated Writer
This one named Nicole.

scribble, scribble, scribble
Journalist Dale Keiger teaches nonfiction scribbling to undergraduate and graduate students at Johns Hopkins University.

The Unofficial Dave Barry Blog
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The official blog of science fiction / horror author Terence West.

William Gibson Blog
Famed author of Neuromancer and Johnny Mnemonic: The Screenplay.

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Joe Clifford Faust's "blog of a working writer: tracking writing projects, musings on the creative process, occasional side trips into music, media, politics, religion, etc."

A Writer's Diary
By Cynthia Harrison, who has the good sense to quote Virginia Woolf: "The truth is that writing is the profound pleasure and being read the superficial."

Bow. James Bow.
The journal of James Bow and his writing.

Ravenlike
Michael Montoure's weblog about writing, primarily horror and speculative fiction.

Globemix
By David Henry, "a poet's weblog from Aberdeen, Scotland."

Modem Noise
By Adrian Bedford, a "fledgling Pro SF Writer, living in Perth, Australia."

boynton
"A wry writerly blog named in honour of a minor character in a minor Shirley Temple film."

Real Writers Bounce
Holly Lisle's blog, "a novelist's roadmap through the art and ordeal of finding the damned words."

2020 Hindsight
By Susan.

downWrite creative
Phil Houtz's notes on the writing life.

Vivid: pieces from a writer's notebook
Blog of Canadian poet Erin Noteboom.

The Literary Saloon
The literary weblog at the complete review.

Rabbit Blog
The rabbit writes on popular culture.

This Girl's Calendar
Momoka writes short stories.

Twists & Turns
Musings by writer Michael Gates.

Plays and Musicals -- A Writer's Introspective
A blog by John D. Nugent - Composer, Playwright, and Artistic Director of the Johnson City Independent Theatre Company

The American Sentimentalist
"Never has any people endured its own tragedy with so little sense of the tragic." Essays by Mark W. Anderson.

Screenwriting By Blog
David C. Daniel writes a screenplay online. "I've decided to publish the process as a way to push myself through it. From concept to completion, it'll be here."

SeanAlonzo.com
Official site of occult fiction author Sean-Alonzo, exploring symbolism, alternative history, philosophy, secret societies and other areas of the esoteric tradition.

Crafty Screenwriting
Maunderings of Alex Epstein, tv scribe, about life, politics, and the tv show I'm co-creating.

Letters From The Home Front
The life of a writer, 21, home schooled, rural living.

Venal Scene
The blog of bite-sized plays inspired by the news (by Dan Trujillo).

'Plaint of the Playwright
Rob Matsushita, a playwright from Wisconsin, "whines a lot."

I Pity Da Fool!
Glenn's adventures in screenwriting.

Time In Tel-Aviv
Hebrew modern literature at its best, by Corinna Hasofferett.

Big Window
Robin Reagler's poetry blog.

John Baker's Blog
Author of the Sam Turner and Stone Lewis novels.

The Writing Life With Dorothy Thompson
What goes on during a writer's busy day?

The Rebel Housewife
Not just a housewife!

Barry's Personal Blog
A running commentary on writing and the writing life.

Bonnie Blog
Maintained by Bonnie Burton of grrl.com.

Writer's Blog.
By easywriter. "From the walls of caves to cyberspace."

Flogging the Quill
Pursuing the art and craft of compelling storytelling, by an editor, Ray Rhamey.

Man Bytes Hollywood
Sharing tools, strategies and resources for the screenwriter's journey.

Mad for the smell of paper
A writing journal.

The Writing Life
A blog by Katey Schultz.

It Beats Working 9-5
A screenwriting blog by a young Canadian screenwriter.

Stealing Heaven From The Lips Of God
Writer & Artist, Dee Rimbaud reflects upon politics, religion, art, poetry, the meaning of life, the nature of God and why toast always lands butter side down on carpets.

Robert Peake
Heart and Mind, Fully Engage ... a poet's website.

Sidestepping Real
By Ren Powell, poet, children’s writer, essayist and editor.

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The Writing Life...

"An artist's only concern is to shoot for some kind of perfection, and on his own terms, not anyone else's."
J.D. Salinger

"All my best friends are writers and are dead."
A friend over beer, Berkeley, winter, 1959

"And it came to pass that all the stars in the firmament had ceased to shine. But how was anyone to know?"
The Half-Life Conspiracy

After October 31, 2006,
new posts are published at

The Writing Life II

(Posts archived here are from 01/10/03 - 10/31/06)

Monday, February 10, 2003

Spy memories
The earlier story of my favorite blind date reminds me of another "dating" story that was unusual. This was when I was in the Army Security Agency, a Russian linguist stationed in Germany during the period before and after the Berlin Wall went up.

Our outfit moved around a lot (if a war started, we were supposed to go the other way since we presumably knew too many secrets to risk being captured), and off and on we were stationed on the outskirts of the "sin city" of Europe, Baumholder, Germany. This once-quaint farm village was host to tens of thousands of troops who practiced war games in the field (waiting for Vietnam, as it turned out), and to service their incredible tastes when they had weekend passes every six or eight weeks were dozens and dozens of G.I. bars along the short Main Street. As I recall, there were only a handful of doors you could enter that would not take you into a bar. Moreover, just before their arrival into town, the train that normally serviced Baumholder only a few days a week suddenly began making many trips a day to carry in the thousands of prostitutes who arrived to service the thousands of soldiers.

A great hobby of the linguists (called "Monterey Marys" by the "real" soldiers, whom we called Animals -- our term coming from our studies at the language school in Monterey, California) was to drink beer in the train station when the prostitutes were arriving into town. Talk about surrealism! We didn't dare wander into town when the Animals were loose; few of us enjoyed their common recreational activities, such as breaking chairs over each other's heads. But in the bright safety of daylight, it was great fun to watch all the whores arrive.

When the Animals were in the field, which was most of the time, we had over 100 bars to ourselves. Since our outfit only numbered 100 linguists, plus as many support troops, we had the run of Baumholder for weeks at a time. Only the regular bar maids (most doubling as prostitutes) were around then but now and again an intriguing "stranger" arrived.

The most interesting was a beautiful, young, intelligent woman who spoke fluent English and identified herself as a University student on break. A University student coming to Baumholder! Right. She would sit alone at a corner table in The Family Club (our favorite bar for the important reason that it was the closest one to our kaserne) reading Faulkner in English. What is wrong with this picture?

At any rate, one by one we linguists introduced ourselves, made the eventual move on her, and one by one she suggested an afternoon picnic in the woods. We all took her up on this, none of us got anywhere with her romantically (except possibly one, to be identified later), but all of us later discovered that we had one thing in common: she had photographed each of us. She also was very interested in the kind of work we did. Hint, hint.

Most of us figured out pretty early that she was a spy, and so we lied through our teeth to her. I know I did. But one poor chap, a shy fellow with an M.A. in mathematics, a very brilliant young man, apparently took a shining to her more than most -- at any rate, he disappeared at the same time that she did. We all assumed that he had defected with her. We never heard from him, or her, again. His name was Harry Smith. It somehow seems fitting.

This was, as far as I know, my one and only date with a spy, a single picnic when my photograph was taken and I lied about my boring work in the motor pool.

2/10/2003 07:46:00 AM | 0 comments

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__The Writing Life

After October 31, 2006, new posts are published at

The Writing Life II

After October 31, 2006,
new posts are published at