-
Cranberry Spungold Wine
Bronze and azure rays of sunlight peered up over the Atlantic, in the distance the seagulls sweep low to the glassy water. I breath the salty mist, shivering in the dawn. Waiting and hoping to work. A shrimp boat casts nets away from its hull. Tinsel and evergreen lie in the streets, fallen…
-
Poetic Sestina
1969 The year was 1969 Robin Stone was the handsome Love Machine Amanda, one of the Beautiful People At nine in cold winter morning She stood out in front of the Plaza Hotel Across the avenue, the snowy banks of Central Park All but one gray pigeon had left the Park…
-
Narrative Poetry Fragment
Bronze and azure rays of sunlight peered up over the Atlantic, in the distance the seagulls sweep low to the glassy water. I breath the salty mist, shivering in the dawn. Waiting and hoping to work. A shrimp boat casts nets away from its hull. Tinsel and evergreen lie in the streets, fallen from their…
-
Haiku and Haibun Poetry
Haiku Winter pecans fall On the porch steps at night time Sounds like someone’s there Haibun We stroll down to boardwalk in winter. No one’s around. The beach stares back in a vacant way. The chilly waters of the Atlantic—glassy. Step into the warmth of the hotdog shop.…
-
Billy Pilgrim and the Metafiction of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
English 680B Seminar in a Theme: Metafiction 17 March 2014 Kurt Vonnegut’s Slaughterhouse-Five has been widely discussed as an antiwar novel based on the author’s experiences in World War II as a German prisoner of war. Vonnegut’s difficulties with voicing are proof of chronic psychic intrusions of the traumatic experiences he experienced I the war…
-
The Metafictional Devices of The Body Artist and “Sunset Blvd.”
On page 90 of Waugh, she discusses the two problems involved in studying the relations between “fiction” and “reality.” She writes that first, there is the paradox concerning the identity of fictional characters; and second there is the status of literary-fictional discourse or the problem of referentiality. Then on page 91, Waugh states, “a fictional…
-
Poetry Essay
Multiple Voices and Shared Identities: Defining Contemporary American Poetry The exercise of describing poetry can be daunting, or in some cases even impossible. While there are rules, traditions, and precedents regarding poetry, there are as many examples of such rules being broken and precedents being ignored as there are examples of them being followed. In…
-
All the While
The Wayfarer’s Elegy All the while, others walk in the shadows outside the cities along the gantlet. Beseeched in the gas lamps and cobblestone streets sequestered between the rivers. Life follows blistering, laid-back, and mellifluous by the shores resting abreast harbor. Thither in the salt marshes sweet grass baskets weaving are the…
-
Poetry of the Five Senses
Sight or Visual Imagery Creamy, yellow butter melting on croissants Clean, white tablecloths in a candlelit dining room Crisp, green lettuce leaves on a round, china plate Brown, bourbon whisky in a pristine crystal glass Fluffy, white chocolate mousse in a pretty, blue dish Taste or Gustatory Imagery Blackberry Beaujolais Toasted almond and coconut…
-
Ars Poetica
Ars Poetica Xanadu “You know a poem not far but near, cultivated, Technicolor, particular. Of a pipe dream, like roaming city streets before dawn, steam rollers, sweepers, sanitation workhorses puff and blow and scrape the concrete, air reeks of diesel fuel and refuse,” Ian’s hands moved viciously in circles as he spoke. “Ian, I…
-
Contemporary Poetry
“Cranberry Spungold Wine Sent Home to Okinawa for Christmas.” Standing outside the tiny fish shop In the mist In the dawn Waiting to work Wanting to see the beach Little boats on the horizon Pulling in the catch nets full of shrimp Quiet in the Christmas morning Feel the nip in the air Busy…
-
Sonnets
Traditional Sonnet By Janet Ridout And you in every sacred silhouette we discern. Lilies that embitter, smell far worse than a weed. For that which longer harbored the concern; Who leaves unsaid the likeness of a need, By haze the image thou be denied! Or if it were, it bore not beauty’s name;…
-
The Morning after the Soiree
The dizzy gossamer randomness of the soiree Left us reeling in the streets until dawn Swirling madly in the district Insouciant and blotto That was last year’s Valentines Blinding lights in the cellar when morning came to soon Copacetic and casual Cunning and complete Crumbling and colorful Mending and bending Lending and sending Paperboys…
-
The Non-Human Characters of the Intercalary Chapters of John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath
English 690-A Major Author Seminar: John Steinbeck 21 February 2014 John Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath came to the forefront of American literary culture following the Great Depression era of the 1930s. The novel, published in 1939, received a mixed reception by the public due to the attention placed on the difficulties and hardships of…
-
Rita Dove’s “Parsley”
Choose one or two poems from this week’s readings and discuss both their subject matter and their themes. Quote from the poem to prove your points. After you have done that, briefly reflect on what you found to be both common subject matters and themes in the poems we have read for this week. Rita…
-
The Big Apple
This used to be Times Square Radio City Music Hall The Great White Way Julian Eltinge‘s Broadway Theatre Girls, Girls, Girls Watching movies at the Empire Peep Shows and Madame Tussaud’s Liberty Theatre on 41st Street The Hudson on 44th The Paramount Concert Venue The Ed Sullivan Theatre Billy Rose’s Diamond Horseshoe The Century The…
-
English Composition Teaching Philosophy
Janet Ridout Dr. Mark Mabrito English 655: Composition Pedagogy 19 November 2013 Teaching in today’s world is more rewarding than ever before, and teaching English composition is the most rewarding of all. I love to teach English composition—the student’s excitement when they truly begin to understand a…
-
Composition Pedagogy
Janet Ridout Dr. Mark Mabrito English 655: Composition Pedagogy 6 November 2013 The Composition Connection of Writing and Thinking How is writing and thinking connected? The connection between writing and thinking is a strong one. Turning to page 7 of Janet Emig’s article “Writing as a Mode of Learning” in Cross-Talk in Comp Theory: A…
-
Cognitive Theory and the Composition Process Model of Flowers and Hayes
Janet Ridout Dr. Mark Mabrito English 655: Composition Pedagogy 31 October 2013 The Processes of Composing a Writing Assignment Part 1: Create a Visual Model of Out Loud Protocol Utilizing Frank Montesonti’s Writing Process While Composing a Newspaper Editorial about the American Electoral College The “Out Loud Protocol” for Composition Writing I have designed based…
-
British Colonial Diaspora in Zadie Smith’s White Teeth
Janet Ridout Dr. Ramie Tateishi English 600 6 October 2013 The Frankfurt School’s Critical Theory of Cultural Studies in Relation to British Colonial Diaspora in Zadie Smith’s White Teeth Contemporary British fiction has had several debuts in the twentieth and twenty-first century. Novels like Joseph Conrad’s 1907 novel The Secret Agent, Virginia Woolf’s 1925 novel…
-
Room 31
When I was in my early thirties, I used to moonlight as a night auditor at the Best Western‘s Dorchester Motor Lodge in Charleston, South Carolina. The dismal minuscule inn was immediately to the left, leaving downtown Charleston bearing west, on I-26. There were all but a hundred single rooms and ten suites in the lodge’s…
-
Characterization in Creative Nonfiction
Janet Ridout Professor Colin Dickey MCW 650—Week 3, Response 1 20 August 2013 Didion, Joan. “Comrade Laski, C.P.U.S.A. (M.-L.).” Didion, Joan. Slouching Towards Bethlehem. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, 2008. 61-6. Print. Overall, I found that I neither liked nor disliked this essay about Michael Laski, Communist sympathizer. It was interesting for me much…
-
Characterization in David Sedaris’s “Giant Dreams, Midget Abilities”
Janet Ridout Professor Colin Dickey MCW 650—Week 3, Response 2 21 August 2013 David Sedaris‘s humorous essay entitled “Giant Dreams, Midget Abilities” explores the literary device of characterization through the lives of several people: his parents, siblings, himself, outsiders at a local shopping mall, and finally through his guitar teacher, Mr. Mancini. Sedaris profiles these ordinary characters…
-
The City of Light in the Dark—Literary Nonfiction Discussion Thread
Modified:8/14/2013 11:06 AM Paris, France, the city of light, is the place in the essay “The City of Light in the Dark” and the place where David Sedaris lived and learned the French language by way of the cinema—American films translated into French with English subtitles. Sedaris welcomes the reader into his home away from home in Paris. “When…
-
A Sense of Place—Literary Nonfiction Discussion Thread
Modified:8/13/2013 8:30 AM A Sense of PlaceThe readings for the first and second weeks take us from a small town in North Carolina, to a homeless shelter in Washington, DC, to New York City, California, Hawaii, Las Vegas, Africa, France, South America, and finally to Kosovo—adventures around the world—as interpreted by several talented and inspiring…
-
The Hippo Conspiracy
(5067 words / 15 pages) The culmination of research on the novel And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks has brought rise to a conspiracy theory rather than a thesis. One might see the title And the Hippos Were Boiled in Their Tanks and draw many conclusions. To some it sounds suspect. To others it is suspect.…
-
Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl”
Notes in the way of Allen Ginsberg’s poetic genius… In 1990, I turned 16 and fell in love with Allen Ginsberg’s “Howl” after a librarian at the county library suggested it as a research topic for my American English class. I asked her to direct me to a book on an American author for my…
-
From the diary of Liza-Jane
PROLOGUE August 31st 1886 in Charleston, South Carolina From the diary of Liza-Jane 2000 words 1 September 1886 I remember the exact time of day following supper in Charleston, South Carolina scarcely before the violent earth, tremor, and quakes erupted in the late summertime of 1886. There was sizable dismantlement of the city center reducing…
-
Wanton Acts of Southern Narrative
23 March 2013 Wanton Acts of Southern Narrative: Notes on the Sublime, the Grotesque, and “Grayling; or, ‘Murder Will Out‘” William Gilmore Simms, Esquire of Charleston, South Carolina (1845) In researching William Gilmore Simms, a prolific literary figure of Southern heritage, an argument is bound to come up in the heated debates over Simms’s sympathies…
-
GAUNTLET
Gauntlet By Janet-Alisa Ridout Charleston, South Carolina All Rights Reserved © 2013 First Edition Dedication For Jacob Epigraph Illustration (GANTLET -31 August 1886 -Ten-Mile, South Carolina-RR tracks buckle and contort- killing many passengers-The Southern Railroad passenger train collided head-on with a Northwestern Railroad passenger train around midnight during massive 7.3 quake. n.d.) Acknowledgments 30 March…
-
Transatlantic Discourse as Defining Nineteenth Century from Twentieth Century Gothic Literature
English 620B American Gothic 24 March 2013 Transatlantic Discourse as Defining Nineteenth Century from Twentieth Century Gothic Literature 366 words / 3 pages Helen Sutherland writes as to the differences distinguishing American gothic fiction from its British heritage lies in the trans-Atlantic…
-
Academia.edu | Account
Academia.edu | Account. Follow me on Academia.edu Related articles Emancipatory Digital Archaeology on Academia.edu (middlesavagery.wordpress.com) More Thoughts on Academic Paywalls (sarahkendzior.com) Kristin Gjesdal (profacero.wordpress.com) “In The Studio,” Academia.edu’s Richard Price Is A Founder On A Mission (techcrunch.com)
-
Feminine Archetypes of American Gothic Literature
ENG 620B American Gothic 17 March 2013 The Female Gothic in American Literature 456 words / 2 pages The American English manifestation of the female condition as a literary significant composite construction based loosely on the artistic license of the respective author’s judgement regarding women and their place in fictional works, as well as female representations as…
-
Book Review
MCW 630B Advanced Fiction Workshop II 10 March 2013 The First Twenty Minutes: Ron Carlson and Writing Fiction 2890 words / 8 pages Ron Carlson Writes a Story remarks on the craft of writing fiction focusing on the creative process of his personal writing experiences and working methods to take him and the mere idea of a…
-
Gantlet
Gantlet Prologue August 31st 1886 in Charleston, South Carolina I remember the exact time of day following supper in Charleston, South Carolina scarcely afore the violent earth tremor and quakes erupted in the late summertime of 1886. There was sizeable dismantlement of the city centre reducing the purview to a smashed apocalyptical sorting harkening times…
-
Book Review
MCW 630B Advanced Fiction Workshop II 10 March 2013 The First Twenty Minutes: Ron Carlson and Writing Fiction “All the valuable writing I’ve done in the last ten years has been done in the first twenty minutes after the first time I’ve wanted to leave the room” (Carlson 47). Ron Carlson…
-
D’Looris: A Story about a Black Bear
D’Looris *** LOORIS – The fair is on its way back to Corn County. The Corn County Agricultural Fair will be September 22 through September 26, 1991 at the Corn County Fairgrounds. The fairgrounds is located at 3200 Hwy. 701S, in Looris. Hours will be 5 p.m. to 11 p.m. Tuesday through Friday, and 1p.m.…
-
Paris Review – The Art of Fiction No. 13, Dorothy Parker
Paris Review – The Art of Fiction No. 13, Dorothy Parker. Related articles Willem de Kooning, Untitled, 1970 (theparisreview.org) Best of 2012: Rook, Swimming Home, Hawthorn & Child, and Object Lessons – Guest Post by Alan Bowden (theselittlewords.com) ‘My Pencils Outlast Their Erasers’: Great Writers on the Art of Revision (theatlantic.com) A Lovely Invitation (jamesdmccallister.wordpress.com)
-
-
Originally posted on 100 days to the doctorate & beyond: Doctoral misery and deadline pressure love company. So I have to say I was somewhat relieved to hear from a fellow traveller on this journey that she too was having completion issues. To put this in perspective, I am not talking about some mythical PhD…
-
Originally posted on Pucker Up Buttercup: I was sitting in a local coffee dispensary, writing the first draft of a blog post in my Moleskine notebook and enjoying a latte (full caffeine, whole milk, five packets of raw sugar … I’m hardcore like that, it’s just the way I roll). This particular establishment had once…
-
-
Originally posted on Meyer Lane's Short Attention Span Press: Stephen King “Kill your darlings, Kill your darlings, even when it breaks your egocentric little scribbler’s heart, kill your darlings.” ~ Stephen King
-
A Moveable Feast of Characters Seen by Ernest Hemingway in Paris–circa 1921-1926
“Write drunk edit sober.” Ernest Hemingway speaks on editing. This quote is also seen as the introduction remarking on writing in my MFA Creative Writing Portfolio https://rand0mwriting.wordpress.com *** Copyright © 2013 All Rights Reserved In Myrtle Beach, SC By Janet Alisa Ridout 3 February 2013 Characters and Characterization in A Moveable Feast Hemingway on Pascin…
-
Cabaret Catharsis
*** Sir Rory van Tory “Oh, bloody hell, Rory; I look like a lunatic. How do I ever get the glue to stick on the back of these homemade pasties you constructed when my nails are still wet? Electra stared helplessly at Rory with tears building up in her eyes ready to run down her…
-
Electra’s Catharsis
07:17 PM 29/01/2013 Sir Rory van Tory “Oh, bloody hell, Rory; I look like a lunatic. How do I ever get the glue to stick on the back of these homemade pasties you constructed when my nails are still wet? Electra stared helplessly at Rory with tears building up in her eyes ready to run…