Goldberg has Umpteenth Life Epiphany
A book for you to avoid. It's on writing. It's by Natalie Goldberg. So I have to confess that I read her book Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within back in 1992 or something. About the time I was dating someone who unfolded a new aspect of her emotional landscape and her self-direction every ten minutes. "Today I learned that I hate my father." "Last night, while twirling daisies in the meadow, I found out that I want to be Mayor." "I don't want to be Mayor because my father would want to be Mayor, and becoming Mayor would be too him-like. I need my own definition." It got to the point where when she told me she wanted to see other women, I just looked at my watch and said, "Listen. I'm off this rocket. When you decide to land, don't look me up." All this turned out to be very fortunate because soon after, I met my someday-would-be-wife, who had no idea that I was her someday-would-be-second-husband.
Got that?
'Bones' was a book filled with too little writing advice and too much self revelation about Nathalie (see above paragraph). It was very personal for her. She discovered so much about herself--at least four or five epiphanies in the short book. I felt like she was a farmer tilling the soil every few pages. Something new and interesting would pop up and before it got a chance to grow into a nice big shade oak, she'd till it over and up would pop broccoli.
Well, it looks like she's got a new book.The Great Failure: A Bartender, a Monk, and My Unlikely Path to Truth . She's up front about it this time. The title says right away that she'd had *gasp* an epiphany. I will not buy the book, though I may page through while browsing in powells. I expect that she works through some very difficult issues, and that she overcomes some very deeply entrentched obstacles. And in the end she is a shining, spanking clean new version of her. The last and final, totally truthful version. Really. Honestly this time.
Until you close the book at which time her self-image will dim.
Note: her books on writing are far more popular than her fiction or poetry--her writing.
ok. Completely unpublished author will get off his soapbox now. And no, I didn't ask the above girlfriend if I could join her and her new girlfriend. Sheer stupidity, I know.
Got that?
'Bones' was a book filled with too little writing advice and too much self revelation about Nathalie (see above paragraph). It was very personal for her. She discovered so much about herself--at least four or five epiphanies in the short book. I felt like she was a farmer tilling the soil every few pages. Something new and interesting would pop up and before it got a chance to grow into a nice big shade oak, she'd till it over and up would pop broccoli.
Well, it looks like she's got a new book.The Great Failure: A Bartender, a Monk, and My Unlikely Path to Truth . She's up front about it this time. The title says right away that she'd had *gasp* an epiphany. I will not buy the book, though I may page through while browsing in powells. I expect that she works through some very difficult issues, and that she overcomes some very deeply entrentched obstacles. And in the end she is a shining, spanking clean new version of her. The last and final, totally truthful version. Really. Honestly this time.
Until you close the book at which time her self-image will dim.
Note: her books on writing are far more popular than her fiction or poetry--her writing.
ok. Completely unpublished author will get off his soapbox now. And no, I didn't ask the above girlfriend if I could join her and her new girlfriend. Sheer stupidity, I know.
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