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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A guide to publishers and publishing services for serious writers, including info on scam agents.

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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!

Links:

Literary archive

The Sextant Press

Personal home page

Electronic screenwriting tutorial

References

Bookstore
Highlights:

Finalist, Oregon Book Award

Practical Screenwriting

Love At Ground Zero

More books.

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
The very one.

The Hive
The official blog of science fiction / horror author Terence West.

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

The Word Foundry
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.

Suggest a writer's blog

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, April 28, 2003

The Humanities
[from a memoir in progress]
Ironically enough, the Cal. Tech. professors who taught courses in the humanities were the ones who first got me thinking of majoring in something other than mathematics. The humanities courses at Tech. were extraordinary, as good as anything I later took at UCLA or the University of Oregon. In American history we compared early drafts of the Declaration of Independence with the final draft, studying the reasons for the changes. In a literature class we studied Joyce’s A Portrait of the Artist as a Young Man. I was getting seriously interested in history and literature for the first time.

In high school, I had been able to earn A’s in these subjects by just going through the motions. The only “literature” that interested me was science fiction. I subscribed to several sci-fi magazines, including Galaxy and Astounding. My favorite authors were Isaac Asimov, Theodore Sturgeon and Robert Sheckley.

Sheckley now lives in Portland, and it was a great thrill to meet him in person decades after I had become a big fan of his wonderful sense of humor. But I was distressed to learn that such a giant of the Golden Age of science fiction struggles to get published today, even though his oldest fans say he is doing his best work. In American culture, the question always is: What have you done lately?

At any rate, at Cal. Tech. I began to pay closer attention in my history, philosophy and literature classes. As a result, my central interests were beginning to change once again. There seemed to be so much I didn’t know, so many books I hadn’t read. How would I ever catch up?

Linus Pauling, my chemistry teacher, published a book called No More War, and I became a Pauling groupy. I followed him to area lectures against nuclear arms, and I marched behind him for peace.

One afternoon I saw him approaching as I was eating my sack lunch on a bench on campus. He asked if he could join me.

Pauling was easy to talk to. After some casual chat, I confessed that I was less happy as a sophomore than I had been as a freshman. I was even thinking of changing my major into something in the humanities. Pauling was gently supportive, telling me that good minds were needed in the humanities as much as anywhere else, that there was no shame in leaving Cal. Tech. to pursue other interests elsewhere. In retrospect, I think his support was a real turning point in my self-reflection about my future.

As it turned out, Quentin was going through the same self-searching. We decided to transfer to the University of California at Berkeley together, leaving at the end of our first sophomore term, which would have us starting over in Berkeley in January, 1959. Since we were in good standing, both with B averages, we were able to get scholarships.

I had discussed none of this with my parents. Now it was time to let them know my decision. I fooled myself into thinking I was doing them a favor because Berkeley was considerably less expensive than Cal. Tech., and with a scholarship I wouldn’t need much in the way of financial support at all. I thought of my move as saving them money. If Dad was disappointed by my plans, he didn’t say anything – but mother was devastated.

She loved being a Cal. Tech. mom. I had no idea. She was on several committees at the college and had become good friends with Mrs. DuBridge, the wife of the college president. Mom had built a new social life around the college, and this would be damaged now that I was leaving Cal. Tech. How could I leave such a fine college – especially since I was maintaining a B average? She must have thought I had lost my mind.

Quentin and I bought an old car for the trip to Berkeley. It was a World War II model, a two-door sedan; loaded with boxes of our belongings – and it didn’t even make it over the San Gabriels. We blew the engine on the long, steep upgrade and ended up trashing the car for pennies on the dollar, shipping our boxes and taking a Greyhound to Berkeley.

We had convinced ourselves that we were transferring to change our majors to something or other in the humanities. But I stayed a math. major, and Quentin stayed a physics major, as if we still needed our past majors as security blankets. We found an apartment to share and got ready to begin a new life. Neither of us had ever lived away from home before.

4/28/2003 07:55:00 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