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Tags: Kate Douglas Wiggin, literary life, literature, motivation, quote, travel, travel writing, travelogues, writing life
My Q&A with Poet Marilyn McCabe
3 Jul
I had the great honor of interviewing poet Marilyn McCabe, who will be teaching a writing workshop this September at the Hobart Festival of Women Writers. We talked about MFAs, her video-poems, and the Adirondacks.
Marilyn McCabe is a poet with a penchant for video-poems, an essayist, a fiction writer, and a singer of jazz and classical music. A Room of Her Own Foundation awarded her poem On Hearing the Call to Prayer Over the Marcellus Shale on Easter Morning the Orlando Prize in the autumn of 2012, and Los Angeles Review published it. Judge Gray Jacobik selected her poetry book Perpetual Motion for publication for the Hilary Tham Capital Collection by The Word Works in 2012. The same publisher went on to publish her second full-length collection of poems, Glass Factory, in 2016. She blogs at https://marilynonaroll.wordpress.com.
Check out the interview here.
Read more of my interviews with guest authors at Hobart Festival of Women Writers here.
Register for the Festival here, and don’t forget to sign up for my writing workshop Wild Women on the Road!
What are your thoughts on MFAs? Are they great for connecting with authors, mentors, and agents … or not worth the hefty price tag?
Here are a few of my posts on MFAs:::
- Reliving Those Awkward MFA Days
- Life after the MFA
- MFAism: Hosting Summer Writing Workshop
- Making the Most Out of My Writing MFA
The Mad Are Holy: Mental Health in Ginsberg’s “Howl”
26 Jun
So excited to share with you that Geez published my essay “The Mad Are Holy” in their current issue about the poetics of resistance. I explore how Allen Ginsberg’s seminal poem “Howl” was met with legal resistance because of its language and sexual content, but how the poem was a call to embrace the people society had determined were “mad.”
Special thanks to my editor Aiden Enns and the entire team at Geez for putting together this great issue focused on the Poetics of Resistance. You can purchase the magazine here.
Wild Women on the Road
19 Jun
I’ve been invited to teach again at the Hobart Festival of Women Writers! I’ll be teaching a writing workshop called Wild Women on the Road. Because why should Jack Kerouac have all the fun?!
Here’s the description:::
Bohemians, rockers, and nature lovers throughout history have blazed their own paths, inspiring generations of women to put the pedal to the metal—and the pen to paper. So why is women’s writing so often derided as “domestic,” and why do so many women’s travelogues read like chick lit?
We’ll discuss ways to elevate the genre in terms of both substance and style as we take a fast-paced ride along with Manal Al-Sharif (Daring to Drive: A Saudi Woman’s Awakening), Lynne Cox (Swimming to Antarctica), Waris Dirie (Desert Flower), Patti Smith (M Train), and other women who defied conformity.
Geared towards those who want to advance plot while maintaining artistic style, in-class writing exercises will equip you with the roadmap you need through storytelling templates and literary devices. Choose your own adventure—and encourage other women to live more fully even within their own neighborhoods!
My writing class is on Sunday, September 8, from 9:30 to 11:30am. The Festival itself will be all weekend long, though, and you’ll want to stay for all the great workshops and readings and to get to know and rest in this cute little town in the Catksills. Hobart is called the Book Village because even though it’s tiny, it’s full of indie bookshops! It’s enough to make any bibliophile swoon.
You can register here.
In the meantime, I’d love to know: What are your favorite stories of women adventurers? Female explorers? Lady bohemians that blazed their own paths?
Want to read more on Hobart?
- Festival co-founder Breena Clarke (her book River, Cross My Heart was an Oprah pick!) interviews me on the Hobart Festival of Women Writers blog
- Simona David interviewed me on WIOX about the Festival
- Calendar Girl — I was featured in the 2019 Hobart Festival of Women Writers Calendar!
- Photos and Video from My Reading at WORD in Jersey City — This was put on by the Hobart Festival of Women Writers
Want to read more on wild women on the road?
- Nerdy Travelers Rejoice: A Bucket List of Literary Museums for Literary Travelers
- Dream Journal: Travels with Chuck D. (about a really strange dream I had)
- That time a road trip ended up with me winning an essay contest!
- My experience road tripping out to Lowell Celebrates Kerouac!
As always, join me on the road! You can find out where I’m appearing next here.
Yiasou!
Stephanie Nikolopoulos is a writer, editor, writing teacher, and speaker based in New York City.
She is the coauthor, with Paul Maher Jr., of "Burning Furiously Beautiful: The True Story of Jack Kerouac's 'On the Road.'"
You can email her at stephanie_701 {@} yahoo.com
Stephanie Nikolopoulos 