Guest Bloggers

Guest Blogger Daniel Ari: Sense And Specificity . . .

Guest Blogger Daniel Ari writes about Sense And Specificity: The Soul of Great Writing Great art is about balance. Okay, great art is about a heck of a lot of things. But one thing that makes great writing stand out from the superfluity of all writing is that it strikes a balance between emotional abstraction and concrete specificity. We want to read about things like devotion, honor and transformation. But the actual words devotion, honor and transformation aren’t concrete enough to sweep a reader away. As I discussed in “How to Make Your Poems Stand Out: Advice From a Reader” for Writer’s Digest online,  abstract nouns can’t be grabbed, and they don’t grab readers. And what’s worse, they tend to come in flocks. Once a writer writes honor, then love and respect want to come in. Then deep, forever, and mutual are at the door, having chased away all the beautiful…

Guest Bloggers

The Miracle of Language: Reminders from 50,000 Feet by Daniel Ari

Guest Blogger Daniel Ari talks about The Miracle of Language: Reminders from 50,000 Feet Chin. An alien from another galaxy encountering those four written characters or the sound we as English speakers make reading them would have no idea what we were writing or talking about. The markings or sounds alone would give the alien no inkling that they even possess a corresponding meaning in the physical world. We write using a complex system of symbols that are almost entirely abstracted from the physical phenomena they indicate. The alien might stand a chance at understanding spoken onomatopoeias, perhaps fetching a connection between the shouted words bang, boom or screech with the aural phenomena they represent. And perhaps the written article a might indicate to the alien the spirit of its meaning as something singular. Yet wouldn’t you be impressed with an alien that could intuit even those connections from our…

Places to submit

Reject A Hit. . . Have you seen this?

Reject A Hit . . . Writer’s Digest Magazine, Rejection Letter column is a hit with local writers. Sonoma County Writer Amy Marincik’s spoof rejection on Great Expectations was selected for the March/April 2013 issue of Writer’s Digest magazine. Writers Forum presenter, Daniel Ari, wrote a pithy rejection letter to e.e. cummings, published in the July/August 2014 issue of the magazine. You, too, can be featured on the last page of Writer’s Digest magazine’s, Reject A Hit column. 300 words or fewer. Submit via email to wdsubmissions@fwmedia.com with “Reject a hit” in the subject line. Go for it! Here is a list of books that have been spoofed rejected. 2012 September       The Godfather by Mario Puzo October           Breakfast at Tiffany’s by Truman Capote Nov/Dec          How the Grinch Stole Christmas! by Dr. Seuss  2013 January           Charlie and the Chocolate Factory by Roald Dahl March/April    Great Expectations by Charles Dickens, spoofed by…