Inspiration
From Dunn To Done
Being a literal child of the 60's (born 1962) I was not inundated with electronic mediums of entertainment as are today's children. My mother was a stay at home mom, my father a soldier. Mom taught me to read before I ever started kindergarten, for which fact I am eternally grateful. I was a very small child who, at age five, was about the size of most three year olds. Neighbors and friends would wonder and exclaim over this tiny little boy sitting on his mother's lap reading a novel out loud to her. My most shining memory of kindergarten was in the first few days of school when I wrote a paper that my teacher was so enamored of that she had me take it to other classes to read aloud. I was so proud I could burst.
By Andrew C McDonald2 years ago in Writers
THE MONKEYS
Once upon a time, in a lush and enchanting forest known as Misty Grove, lived a lively troop of monkeys. This group of monkeys was unlike any other in the entire jungle. They were known for their boundless energy, quick wits, and their insatiable curiosity, which often led them into all sorts of amusing and sometimes troublesome situations.
By Albertine Onabamiro2 years ago in Writers
Colorado
Being a high school student in the UK is very different from the American experience, I can say with confidence. Apart from our archaic requirements of uniforms and umbrellas (because monsoon season runs all year), there's also the mood. I am not writing from experience of attending an American high school, but this starts because I grew up on American TV shows. Ask any British kid growing up in the 90s, the first accent you learn to replicate is the American one thanks to the likes of Melissa Joan Hart, the Mowry Twins and The Midnight Society.
By Michael Brennan2 years ago in Writers
A Personal Opinion on the Power of Redundancy to Lift Up Your Writing and Deliver a Better End Product
Author's preface: A few years back Random House copy chief Benjamin Dreyer published an article in which he suggested a list of redundant words which he said we should "delete" from our writing. I took that as a challenge and prepared a short essay using as many of these words as I could squeeze in. Below is the final result of that effort.
By Everyday Junglist2 years ago in Writers
There is a Price to Be Paid For “Dumbing Down” Your Writing to Appeal to the “Average” Reader
There seems to be some consensus, at least on across the blogosphere, that in order to appeal to the so called “average reader” and maximize readership it is necessary to “dumb down” one’s writings. In the past I have come down very hard against this idea. In particular I take issue with the idea of grade level writing, or trying to keep one’s style and grammar and vocabulary choices at or below a certain arbitrary grade level, sixth and eighth grade seem to be the most common options. The idea being that people are generally not all that smart, not that patient, and will quickly click away from anything that challenges their intellect or in which they encounter unusual words they are not familiar with. Basically anything that makes them to think too much or forces them to come to terms with their own ignorance. Recently a writing colleague on a different site responded to my insistence that I would never dumb down my writing by asking a very simple question, would it hurt to do so? She went on to explain that as a non native speaker of English it is even more difficult for her than for most to keep up with “higher level” writing and she lamented that it was very frustrating having to constantly “go up and get a dictionary” to look up words that she did not know. I will admit the non native speaker was not the stereotype of the person I had in my head when imagining these so called ordinary joe’s and jane’s, and her points had some validity. They certainly forced me to stop and think about my position, and ultimately caused me to write this piece. For that I am eminently thankful to her and her question.
By Everyday Junglist2 years ago in Writers
Broken Beauty
Being a poet at an age as young as 11, some might say is impossible. When one thinks of poetry, it is thought-provoking, gut-wrenching, heart-breaking, and how can an 11 year old possibly have enough worldly experience to write anything so meaningful and deep?
By Lizzy Rose2 years ago in Writers
