Super-glued Conversations
Look! I'm actually posting during the day as opposed to the wee hours of the night (are the wee hours limited to only the morning, or can they be night too? hmm.). Truly a miracle.
I'm an editor for our campus literary magazine, Inkstone, and like an idiot I decided to volunteer (actually more like arm-wrestle) for the chance to write the editor's note. Turns out my long hours devoted to arm-wrestling tutorage have finally paid off...so here I am needing to write the editor's note for the spring issue. And I said "like an idiot" before because I didn't really have any idea in mind for actually writing the creature. But I think I might now...(perhaps)
I've been thinking a lot lately about conversations (ok that phrase "thinking a lot lately" seems to be my blog chorus line...ah well). In my musings I'm forming this theory that conversations, along with experiences of course, have a major part in shaping who we are as individuals. I'm not talking about the everyday "howareyoudoingfine," five-minute deals that we all feel obligated to have. What I mean is the conversations in which the words hold so much weight that you feel as though you could snatch them out of the air and hold them in your hand and super-glue them to the walls of your heart. Maybe I'm romanticizing it all, but those conversations are where I verbalize who I am. I put into concrete words the thoughts and emotions that embody my being--put them out there to be listened to, absorbed, and reflected by those I trust and connect with most. Those words let my intimates know me, but more than that--they let me know myself.
While searching for famous quotes about conversation, I came across this one from Laurence Sterne (about whom I know nothing beyond the fact that he was an Irish writer in the 1700's). He says, ""Writing, when properly managed, . . . is but a different name for conversation." There it was: my Inkstone editor's note condensed into a sentence (or so I hope). But regardless, little fireworks exploded in my brain, and thoughts began to connect. As I said earlier, when I converse, I put my thoughts and emotions into concrete words--how much more then is writing an extension, even an amplification of that principle. These Inkstone contributors, through their poems, stories, essays, and art, are beginning (actually continuing) a conversation. They are contributing their part of the dialogue that is formed by literature and the arts. As we put out this issue of Inkstone (eventually!), we are inviting readers to listen in, eavesdrop on this conversation about the contributors' lives. Now the question remains as to what the readers' response will be.
I'm an editor for our campus literary magazine, Inkstone, and like an idiot I decided to volunteer (actually more like arm-wrestle) for the chance to write the editor's note. Turns out my long hours devoted to arm-wrestling tutorage have finally paid off...so here I am needing to write the editor's note for the spring issue. And I said "like an idiot" before because I didn't really have any idea in mind for actually writing the creature. But I think I might now...(perhaps)
I've been thinking a lot lately about conversations (ok that phrase "thinking a lot lately" seems to be my blog chorus line...ah well). In my musings I'm forming this theory that conversations, along with experiences of course, have a major part in shaping who we are as individuals. I'm not talking about the everyday "howareyoudoingfine," five-minute deals that we all feel obligated to have. What I mean is the conversations in which the words hold so much weight that you feel as though you could snatch them out of the air and hold them in your hand and super-glue them to the walls of your heart. Maybe I'm romanticizing it all, but those conversations are where I verbalize who I am. I put into concrete words the thoughts and emotions that embody my being--put them out there to be listened to, absorbed, and reflected by those I trust and connect with most. Those words let my intimates know me, but more than that--they let me know myself.
While searching for famous quotes about conversation, I came across this one from Laurence Sterne (about whom I know nothing beyond the fact that he was an Irish writer in the 1700's). He says, ""Writing, when properly managed, . . . is but a different name for conversation." There it was: my Inkstone editor's note condensed into a sentence (or so I hope). But regardless, little fireworks exploded in my brain, and thoughts began to connect. As I said earlier, when I converse, I put my thoughts and emotions into concrete words--how much more then is writing an extension, even an amplification of that principle. These Inkstone contributors, through their poems, stories, essays, and art, are beginning (actually continuing) a conversation. They are contributing their part of the dialogue that is formed by literature and the arts. As we put out this issue of Inkstone (eventually!), we are inviting readers to listen in, eavesdrop on this conversation about the contributors' lives. Now the question remains as to what the readers' response will be.
posted by Mandy at 4:03 PM
1 Comments:
Here's the beauty about writing. You almost never get to hear the other person's answer to the conversation you throw into the world. That's sad. But your conversation gets to be condisered and deliberate. You can set something aside and ponder it for six years and then get it right before you send it off to be heard. That's happy.
Of course, with Inkstone deadlines, that's not always the case.
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