Writing Above Your Head
In the latest Glimmer Train Bulletin, Clayton Luz has a wonderful piece about “writing above your head,” advice that he first heard from Richard Ford. Here’s a snippet of what…
In the latest Glimmer Train Bulletin, Clayton Luz has a wonderful piece about "writing above your head," advice that he first heard from Richard Ford. Here's a snippet of what Clayton says:
Sometimes we have to let things we experience age a while in our souls before they ripen into a knowing. I'm with Henry James, who wrote "Experience is never limited, and it is never complete; it is an immense sensibility, a kind of huge spider-web of the finest silken threads suspended in the chamber of consciousness, and catching every air-borne particle in its tissue."
In other words, I had to live a sum of life before Ford's meaning reached my consciousness.
I understand now. My short story "When the Wind Blows the Water Grey" represents my first published fiction. And it got that way because I finally wrote above my head, I believe. What does that mean? …
Or: head to the full bulletin from Glimmer Train.
Jane Friedman is a full-time entrepreneur (since 2014) and has 20 years of experience in the publishing industry. She is the co-founder of The Hot Sheet, the essential publishing industry newsletter for authors, and is the former publisher of Writer’s Digest. In addition to being a columnist with Publishers Weekly and a professor with The Great Courses, Jane maintains an award-winning blog for writers at JaneFriedman.com. Jane’s newest book is The Business of Being a Writer (University of Chicago Press, 2018).
