Skip to main content

Quote by Emily Carr 1871-1945

"I think that one's art is a growth inside one. I do not think one can explain growth. It is silent and subtle. One does not keep digging up a plant to see how it grows." E.C.

Just as one does not dig up a plant to see how it grows ---one does not judge the hue or color of a flower until it blooms.

Yet we seem to want, I seem to want, to dissect and judge every piece of my story before it's completed - when it is in its infancy.

That's what I'm thinking about today.
Writing, it really is up and down.
Off here to create today's portion of my story.

Blessings!

Comments

  1. Great quote, and I know what you mean about that need to dissect and judge a work in progress. It trips me up on a regular basis.

    ReplyDelete
  2. I've heard so many different recommendations for writing. Write the story straight through; write a chapter at a time - then review. Write every day, then rewrite the next day. Who knows what is right? I guess whatever FEELS right for YOU. The main point is.....WRITE!

    ReplyDelete
  3. I agree with Pat. I write many different ways. Do what is best for you. Come join me on Writing Wednesday on my blog. Good luck with your story.

    ReplyDelete
  4. That's probably why I'm not a writer...even as I think of a story in my head, I'm already tearing it apart, redoing it, throwing it away in the storage section of my brain! Thanks for the recommend of a book in your previous post. I'll check it out!

    ReplyDelete
  5. I write mine until they're done -- but then I have to make sense of what I wrote. Once I lose the fever, writing becomes work -- and I lose the fever as soon as the story is finished the first time. I have three finished novels sitting here waiting for me to make sense of them.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Been there and done that and still doing that!
    The most fun is in the creating of story.
    After the creation work is done then it's the letting it marinate. Then the job is to find the story within the story - hard work begins.
    That's why I have more unfinished stories than finished. I honor the creative part and I dishonor the hard work of finishing the product.
    I'm trying to do better. But I'm here to say it's HARD.

    ReplyDelete
  7. I love Emily Carr. Thank you for bringing her words to my consciousness today.

    ReplyDelete
  8. Hey Barb, I 'm just catching up on your blogs. What a great quote from Emily Carr! I have to force myself to "write through" because for me the editing process is easier. Once my story is written, I almost breathe a sigh of relief–it's out! The fine tuning–finding just the right word, having a new insight, making a sudden change–is actually fun. As Pat said, each have to find our own way.

    ReplyDelete

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Shingles: not the roofing kind...

Just when I thought things could not get any worse at our house my husband R came down with shingles. On the day I had to be at the hospital in Columbus with one adult daughter in the morning and then go to Cincinnati to pick up her husband after his stomach surgery the day before, R gets up with a rash that had turned to blisters. We made a quick dash 40 miles away to our family Dr. for a check up and yes my diagnosis was correct. Shingles! So armed with two medications we headed to the medical center to see our daughter, then to Cincinnati to pick up her husband and then home to collapse and hope that that's the end of our downward spiral. I'm worn to a frazzle and so is R. No time for writing or fretting about writing. I do feel good knowing that I have some contest entries out (short stories and one novel) and will be working on my novel at least two days this coming week. I have my writers meeting on Monday at Great Expectations Cafe and Book Store and look for...

A Revolutionary New Diet...

Recently I went on a diet. Like most diets this one was scheduled around a major life event. My daughter's wedding. There would be no shopping for a mother-of-the-bride dress until the pounds came off. Typically I go on a diet on Monday and by Wednesday I've folded beneath the weight of a German chocolate cake. I've been hijacked by as little as a stale pink sugar wafer discovered in the dark recesses of the bread drawer. But this time things were going to be different. I could tell as I went to get the mail and discovered the first crocus of the season. Life was looking up. Even though an icy rain began to fall, my spirits weren't dampened. Not even when huge drops pelted me on the head and I had to dash inside. My latest plan would revolutionize dieting. If it worked for me it would work for the world. I smelled a book deal. I could see myself all made-over and liposuctioned sitting between Oprah and Dr. Oz. It was full speed ahead. Gone were those complex menus...

Mother's Leather Britches...

My mother gardened all her life. It was one of her great loves, next to family, God, and country. Because she grew up during the Depression, she learned to use every last item from her garden for canning, preserving, drying or pickling. Every year at the end of the green bean season she made leather britches, dried beans that would keep for the winter. These were the last beans hanging on the vines. The beans inside had grown to full size with outsides a bit withered. They were beyond the stage to can or preserve, or even to pickle. Although her fried pickled green beans and corn bread were the best in the world. (Well, next to her biscuits and fried apples.) Mother started the drying process with clean beans. She would spread a clean white sheet on a table in the wash room and spread the beans out on that, giving them space to dry. Sometime she would carry the sheet outside and put them on a table in the sun to further the process. The next step involved needle and thread ...