Yikes, it's been more than a week since my last post. I've been busy, tutoring at the Writing Center 20 hours per week, and reading, reading, reading: Franklin, Anne Bradstreet, Thoreau, Emerson, Dickinson, Faulkner, Melville and others, as well as some dense works of literary theory and criticism, just in the first three weeks of the semester.
The Benjamin Franklin autobiography was quite revealing, and it changed my impression of that founding father quite drastically. He was a vegetarian for a while but caved in at the smell of fried cod, he had several "intrigues with low women" and he did some fairly dirty journalism (making himself wealthy in the process) as publisher of the Pennsylvania Gazette. Yet his reputation remains that of a pillar of American virtue and values. Hmmm ... maybe that's not ironic after all. But I digress.
The greatest challenge so far has been writing fiction for the workshop I'm taking. This week I finished my first short story -- the first bit of fiction I've completed since the seventh grade. I've decided not to post it on the blog, but anyone who wants to read it can e-mail me at smokinbill@aol.com, and I'll send you a copy of the text, with my compliments.
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