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Author: harmamae

  • Haven’t You Heard of Lincoln’s Doctor’s Dog?

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    harmamae
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    Haven’t you heard of Lincoln’s Doctor’s Dog? It is the world’s biggest bestseller, or it should be, if this old saying from the publishing industry was true. Apparently book about Lincoln, books about doctors, and books about dogs all sell extremely well (at least before the internet came along, and fell in love with cats…

  • The Pleasures of Not Writing

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    “The pleasures of not writing are so great that if you ever start indulging them you will never write again” —John Updike. This quote grabbed me because it is something I’ve been struggling with a lot lately – I’ve managed to keep writing a fair amount, but each step is a momentous struggle of motivation.…

  • How a Non-Existent Word Got in the Dictionary

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    Last Friday, we have some fun looking at potential new English words, and how the English language is changing. Since then, I ran across the delightful story of the non-word ‘dord,’ a word you’ve probably never heard of – because it isn’t actually a word. But for eight whole years it was included in Webster’s…

  • What, the English Language Changes? Literally?

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    First, a somewhat related note – check out my story ‘One House, Six Decades – Three Generations’ on the new CBC Hyperlocal site. The CBC, our venerable old Canadian broadcaster (for those of you who aren’t Canadian and didn’t know), wanted stories of change from Canadians across the country – change in people and places,…

  • The World Is Better On Coffee (But It Won’t Make You Write Better)

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    harmamae
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    “Many people claim coffee inspires them, but, as everybody knows, coffee only makes boring people even more boring.” – Honore de Balzac, On Modern Stimulants Coffee won’t make you write better, but it might make you feel better. A large cup of coffee every morning, laced with cream and sugar and carried with me in…

  • Argue Your Way to Knowledge!

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    harmamae
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    “Where there is much desire to learn, there of necessity will be much arguing, much writing, many opinions; for opinion in good men is but knowledge in the making.” – John Milton According to Milton: the desire to learn -> opinions -> knowledge. In order to arrive at knowing something, you have to make the…

  • Ranking Jane Austen – Is It Possible?

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    Emma Mansfield Park Pride and Prejudice Sense and Sensibility Northanger Abbey Persuasion  Is this a sensible way to rank Jane Austen’s books? As far as I can discern, this is how Adelle Waldman ranks them, in “I Read Everything Jane Austen Wrote, Several Times: Here Are Some of the Many Things I Learned.” Fans of…

  • Making Fun of Readers?

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    harmamae
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     I would never make fun of anyone who loved to read. – Juliet Ashton, in The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society People who love to read get made fun of, sometimes. This is probably leftover from childhood, when the bookworms were thought of as kids who sat in the corner and had no…

  • I Wish I Could Write

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    harmamae
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    I wish I could write well. What do you mean? you say to me. You’ve got a blog. Of course you can write. But I still wish I could write well. If you’ve been following my blog lately, you probably noticed I’ve been posting less. It’s not because I’ve run out of ideas. I always…

  • Advice for an Introvert in Fiction

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    harmamae
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    “I certainly have not the talent which some people possess,” said Darcy, “of conversing easily with those I have never seen before. I cannot catch their tone of conversation, or appear interested in their concerns, as I often see done.” “My fingers,” said Elizabeth, “do not move over this instrument in the masterly manner which…