Yesterday was the first meeting of my summer class, David Emblidge’s travel literature. We went over the syllabus, ate cookies, and took a field trip to the Common to check out one of the Civil War monuments. During our class discussion, David made sure to emphasize that we should be framing the class in terms [...]
Entries Tagged as 'Tanya'
Reclaiming Poe
April 27th, 2009 No Comments
Breaking literary news right in our own backyard: the Globe today published this article about how the city of Boston will rename a square at the south end of the Common for Edgar Allen Poe to celebrate his bicentennial. Apparently some Boston College students have begun a crusade to reclaim Poe for Boston, though while [...]
Tags: Boston · Tanya · This Week in Publishing
How is Fenway like a writing desk?
April 13th, 2009 1 Comment
Spring has come again, which means the days are longer, the weather is warmer (umm) and the crazies are out in full force. It also means something else in Boston - that baseball season is upon us. Professional baseball players are generally considered to be one of the most superstitious breeds of folks around. From [...]
Tags: Tanya · writers' habits · writing process
Judging books by their covers
April 6th, 2009 4 Comments
Recently in Desktop Publishing, we completed a project that involved redesigning the cover of a book of our choice. As I clicked around a few blogs dedicated to the subject of book cover design, I started thinking about how important a cover really is. It has say something about the book, literally or symbolically, but [...]
Tags: book covers · books · bookstores · emerson courses · Tanya
Coming Soon: Vernacular the book?
March 30th, 2009 1 Comment
These days, it seems like nothing is pure when it comes to media. Books turn into movies, which spawn video games and TV series. Magazines and newspapers direct readers of the print edition to exclusive online content (and vice versa). Authors of books take advantage of free publicity opportunities by becoming bloggers. And now, the [...]
Tags: blogs · books · publishing industry · Tanya
Writers = wallflowers?
March 23rd, 2009 1 Comment
I’m currently reading The Unlikely Disciple by Kevin Roose, a Brown student who, during his sophomore year, decides to transfer to a different school for a semester to see how the other half lives. Student transfers are no big whoop – unless, of course, the new school is Liberty University, otherwise known as Jerry Falwell’s [...]
Tags: reading · Tanya · writers' habits
Kiss Me, I’m an Irish Author
March 17th, 2009 No Comments
Even if you’ve been living under a rock, you probably realize that this Tuesday is St. Patrick’s Day. When I was in college at Florida State, St. Patty’s Day meant the bars opened at 8am, the streets reeked of beer, and not wearing green meant you’d be black and blue by the end of lunch. [...]
Tags: literary taste · reading · Tanya
Damn! Why didn’t I think of Pride and Prejudice and Zombies?
March 9th, 2009 2 Comments
I was going to use my spring break to catch up on some reading – revisit the classics, explore some new genres. I was going to write for two hours every day. I was going to do a ton of research and come up with a blog post that would blow you all away. Unfortunately, [...]
Tags: books · puns · Tanya · writing disasters
When Grammar Attacks
March 2nd, 2009 2 Comments
I’ve always secretly enjoyed grammar. Diagramming sentences in high school English class? Yes, please. Proofreading my friends’ screenplays/med school applications/final papers? Sign me up. It’s gotten to the point where I have an instinctive, irrepressible need to correct apostrophes and add commas to whatever flyers, advertisements, and even menus I come into contact with during [...]
Tags: Bridget · grammar · language usage · punctuation · Tanya
Reading Is the New Black
February 23rd, 2009 1 Comment
Last night, so I hear, the Academy Awards were broadcast. Obviously, I didn’t watch them. I did, however, recently pick up a shiny, overpriced copy of Richard Yates’ Revolutionary Road at one of those shiny, overpriced airport bookstores during my last soul-crushingly boring wait before a flight. I had walked in just to browse and [...]
Tags: movies · Richard Yates · Stephen King · Tanya