latest: where did you put your faith?

I'm a guest blogger today at Jason Boyett's cool O Me Of Little Faith blog on Belief.net

Posted via email from jsb

bookish coffee sideways: v cool design

designed by Anurag Nema

D'Espresso, 317 Madison Avenue (42nd Street)

Nema turns a normal room sideways. Glazed tiles printed with images of books created the illusion of bookshelves tilted sideways, running along the ceiling, down the rear wall and onto the floor.

very cool

via NYT

Posted via email from s@lly l-j

naughty bad mannered piggies LIVE

Posted via email from s@lly l-j

portraits, photos + something to do with death

Truman Capote 1947, by Cartier-Bresson

"As time passes by and you look at portraits, the people come back to you like a silent echo. A photograph is a vestige of a face, a face in transit. Photography has something to do with death. It's a trace." Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908-2004)

must be why old photos can make you feel sad.

at least they do me.

new blog up: on writing--first you must lose yourself

"I'm not responsible for my photographs. Photography is not documentary, but intuition, a poetic experience. It's drowning yourself, dissolving yourself and then sniff, sniff, sniff--being sensitive to coincidence. You can't go looking for it; you can't want it or you won't get it. First you must lose your self. Then it happens." Henri Cartier-Bresson (1908-2004)

I think it's the same thing with writing--you as the writer are no more responsible for your stories than Cartier-Bresson was for his photographs.

The story tells you how it wants to be told. And it's cleverer than you are.

You're like the servant of the story. Your job is to be available and to listen. Do what you're told. And then get out of the way. "First you must lose yourself."

Being available means showing up, being "one of the people on whom nothing is lost" (Henry James).

Listening means not shoe-horning things that into the story just because you love how they sound (those "Darlings" G K Chesteron tells us to "murder").

If you're asking, "Am I a good writer?" you've got in the way of the story. It's not about you, remember. It's about the story.

The only question you need to be asking is: "Am I telling a good story?"

And then get out of the way and let the story through--whatever it is and in whatever way it wants to be told.