Volume V, Issue 24 June 13, 2016 Dear ,
You may not be familiar with the word nonce, and if that’s the case, I’m happy to introduce you to its meaning: “coined for or used on one occasion”. While it’s often used of a word or expression, it also applies to a poetic form that is created by a poet for one of his/her works.
That’s the case for this week’s featured writer, Justin Hunt, who graciously
agreed to share a prize-winning poem he wrote about his parents. The contest judge wrote of Justin’s poem: "Here, two voices from the same person meld the present and past in familiar, imagery-laden language in a poem of astounding beauty. The poet's nonce form and the use of italics contribute greatly to content. There's not one word that doesn't belong in this lovely and original tribute to a mother and father."
I am so honored to have Justin in my Thursday evening Under Construction class. While he uses tour class time to work on his memoir (you'll learn more about that when you meet him below), his prose exhibits a lyricism and rhythm that has been heightened through the many hours he has spent writing poetry.
How about you? If you're a poet, have you ever tried creating a
nonce form? It's a means to illuminate your subject, and is certainly a way to express your own sensibility. If you're not a poet, you can try your hand at inventing a form in this week's prompt. Practicing poetry is a great way to improve your prose. It makes good sense that focusing on the placement of each word and phrase would make one more facile with language, don't you think?
Have a great week, and I hope you take the time for a bit of "nonce-sense"!
Love and light, Maureen Upcoming WordPlay WRITING CLASSES AT CHAUTAUQUA, NEW YORK
Our life stories are a precious legacy. Writing them is a gift, not only to ourselves, but to
those who love us - they'll be treasured for generations to come. Come learn engaging tools and techniques to retrieve and record your adventures, loves, losses, successes, and more with ease and enjoyment, no matter where you are in the process.
Course No: | 1700 |
| When: | Monday, June 27 – Thursday, June 30, 12:30 – 2:30 p.m. |
| Location: | Hall of Ed.(Sheldon), rm 201, Chautauqua Institution |
| Cost: | $80, plus $22 for optional textbook (payable to instructor) |
Reap the benefits writing can provide—physically, mentally, emotionally, and spiritually—in this class in which you'll learn and practice whole brain methods for using writing as a transformative process as well as a creative one. These tools can be used to create essays, poems, memoir, fiction and/or nonfiction. For beginners and seasoned
writers.
Course No: | 1705 |
| When: | Tuesday, July 5th – Friday, July 8th, 12:30 – 2:30 p.m. |
| Location: | Turner, 104, Chautauqua Institution |
| Cost: | $80.00 plus $22 for optional textbook (payable to instructor) |
Ever wondered what makes a poem a poem? Or wished your writing had more finesse? This class that explores
"poetic ingredients" in the areas of content, sound, and form will increase your expertise—in poetry and prose. Learn how to identify and use these ingredients, as well as how poems you love can inspire and instruct you. All levels welcome.
Course No: | 1706 |
| When: | Monday, July 11th – Thursday, July 14th, 3:00 – 5:00 p.m. |
| Where: | Hultquist, 201A, Chautauqua Institution |
| Cost: | $80.00 plus $22 for optional textbook (payable to instructor) |
Buying Passes Your class registration will admit you to our grounds for the duration of your class. You do not need an additional gate pass unless you plan to come early or stay late. There is a charge for parking.
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SUMMER WRITING RETREAT
(Writing as Renewal / Creating New Writing / Tools for a Writing Life)
Renew and delight yourself. The Summer Writing Retreat is an opportunity to create new pieces of writing and/or new possibilities for our lives. Enjoy various seasonal prompts; they elicit beautiful material that can be shaped into essays, poems,
stories, or articles. After a communal lunch, you’ll have private time which can be used to collage, work with a piece of writing from the morning, or play with a number of other writing prompts and methods. You’ll take home new ideas, new drafts, and new possibilities. $97 includes lunch and supplies.
WHERE: South Charlotte area. Details will be provided upon registration.
WHEN: Saturday, August 6th, 10:00 a.m. to 5:00 p.m. TO REGISTER: To pay with a check via mail, email info@wordplaynow.com for instructions. To pay online, please click this link to check out using PayPal.
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(Expanding Our Creativity; Learning New Tools for Our Writing and Our Lives; Creating New Writing)
Discover your own genius as you learn to apply seven fascinating approaches of Leonardo da Vinci to your writing. These techniques enliven non-fiction, poetry and fiction. Expect fun, inspiration and writing galore in
your preferred genre, with opportunities to share your work.
$630 for one week-long session (lodging and meals are additional – options can be found on the Folk School website). WHERE: John Campbell Folk School, 1
Folk School Road, Brasstown, NC 28902
WHEN: Sunday, August 7 – Saturday August 13, 2016.
TO REGISTER: To register, please click this John Campbell Folk School link to register directly from them.
More WordPlay opportunities here. WordPlay Success Story
"Without the support and critique of Maureen and my fellow writers
in Under Construction, I wouldn’t be where I am today.
I wouldn’t have a manuscript to fine-tune....
Each time we meet,my blind spots are revealed.
Each time we meet, I learn
something..."
Meet Justin Hunt
A native of rural Kansas, Justin Hunt lives in Charlotte, NC. In 2012, he retired from a long business career to write poetry and memoir. His work has won several awards and appears in (or is forthcoming) in a
number of literary journals and contest-based collections, including The Atlanta Review, Comstock Review, Dogwood, Spoon River Poetry Review, Kakalak, Kansas City Voices and What Matters, among others. What Justin says about WordPlay
Four years ago this
month, I walked away from a career in the corporate world. I was sixty-two. For decades, I’d put in long hours, sixty or more a week. For decades, I’d written nothing of a personal nature except letters and emails to friends and family. And yet, a voice inside me wanted out—a voice shaped by having lived long enough to embrace love, suffer great loss and feel the creep of my own mortality. When I was at last able to retire, I did so with the intention of writing poetry and memoir. But I nursed
doubts. Could I do it? If so, how would I do it? And would anyone want to read it?
I joined two poetry critique groups as soon as I quit my job. In the fall of 2012 and spring of 2013, I enrolled in memoir writing classes at Queens University. I learned that I had much to learn. I learned also that the story of my father and my relationship with him wouldn’t let go of me. It was the subject that kept
surfacing in the short prose pieces I was cobbling together, and by the summer of 2013, I began to suspect I might have a full-length memoir on my hands—if only I could summon the energy and discipline to write it.
That same summer, I took a one-evening class with Maureen Ryan Griffin and spoke with her about signing up for the fall session of Under Construction. It seemed like the right vehicle for
me, but I still wrestled with the belief that I should be inspired and committed enough to write on my own. I should just write what I wanted to write, I thought, then turn my work over to an editor. But as the summer wore on and I wasn’t writing much, I surrendered and signed up. It was, in retrospect, a damn good thing I did.
With the exception of one summer, I’ve been writing with an Under
Construction group ever since. It didn’t take me long to discover that I work best within UC’s structure. Knowing that each piece I bring in will be reviewed not only by Maureen but also a group of committed, talented writers is a huge motivation for me. I’m not working in a vacuum, and hearing and critiquing the work of others informs my own.
At this point, I’ve taken enough dead-end turns to know
that feedback from other writers is essential to my creative process—while I’m working on something, not just at the end of a manuscript. If this is a weakness, as I once thought it was, then I’m a 97-pound weakling, and I need the workouts Maureen administers with her keen eye for inconsistency and her ability—and willingness—to expose language that is so florid, flat or flabby, it begs for extra hours in the gym.
Earlier this year, I finished the manuscript of Dominoes Are Played at Joe’s Place, the memoir about my dad and me. I’ve shared sections of the book with people from various walks of life, and they’re asking for the rest of the story. I’m encouraged, though cautious, aware that a lot of hard work still lies ahead.
I’ve reorganized Dominoes to improve flow,
and I’m now working through the entire book, revising it chapter by chapter. Without the support and critique of Maureen and my fellow writers in Under Construction, I wouldn’t be where I am today. I wouldn’t have a manuscript to fine-tune.
I continue to use our UC group as a sounding board for the more challenging revisions I’m making. Each time we meet, my blind spots are revealed. Each time we meet,
I learn something—despite my age. How can you put a price on that? Featured Writing
“My Mother, My Father”
by
Justin Hunt
…and Daddy sprints home from church—
two hundred yards, just to show
he can still do it at seventy-four,
skinny
wool-suit legs birding
over sidewalks poured
when he was a boy,
all of them uneven now,
heaved like creek-ice by the roots
of settlers' catalpas and elms….
You can read Justin's poem in its entirety (and see its nonce form)
WordPlay Now! Writing
Prompt This is WordPlay—so why not revel in the power and
potential of one good word after another? This week, it's "nonce."
PROMPT:
Stretch yourself, even if you're not a poet. Either write a new poem, making up your own form (through the way you arrange your lines, stanzas, and/or rhyme scheme, if you have one) or take a piece of
prose and "set it to poetry" (as opposed to setting it to music. What do you notice about your words when you play with the way they're arranged on the page?
MAUREEN RYAN GRIFFIN, an award-winning poetry and nonfiction writer, is the author of Spinning Words into Gold, a Hands-On Guide to the Craft of Writing, a grief workbook entitled I Will Never Forget You, and three collections of poetry, Ten Thousand Cicadas Can't Be Wrong, This Scatter of Blossoms and When the Leaves Are in the Water. One of her long-held dreams came true in July of 2015 when Garrison Keillor read one of her poems on The Writer's Almanac. She believes, as author Julia Cameron says, "We are meant to midwife dreams for one another."
Maureen also believes that serious "word work" requires serious WordPlay, as play is how we humans best learn—and perform. What she loves best is witnessing all the other dreams that come true for her clients along the way. Language, when used with
intentionality and focus, is, after all, serious fuel for joy. Here's to yours! |
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