Now I’m home, which means playing catch-up, unpacking suitcases, and setting my sights on the work again. Thank you to everyone who made Kindling Words such a special experience!
I have more photos, but frankly, Kate Messner’s are much better, so you should look at hers. Thank you, Kate, for being so handy with a camera and posting quickly.
As requested and promised, here are the two quotes that I used at the end of my presentation on Sunday.The first is from Scottish mountaineer William Hutchinson Murray. He was talking about planning and executing mountain climbing trips, but it applies to writing, too:
“Until one is committed, there is hesitancy, the chance to draw back, always ineffectiveness. Concerning all acts of initiative (and creation), there is one elementary truth the ignorance of which kills countless ideas and splendid plans: that the moment one definitely commits oneself, then providence moves too. A whole stream of events issues from the decision, raising in one’s favor all manner of unforeseen incidents, meetings and material assistance, which no man could have dreamt would have come his way. I learned a deep respect for one of Goethe’s couplets:
Boldness has genius, power and magic in it!””
[A loose 1835 translation of Faust]
And the second, a comment made by William Faulkner when speaking to a group of eager writing students at Princeton.
(You might want to tape this to your desk)
“Don’t be ‘a writer’. Be writing.”