If you look at the masthead of the-wwp.com, you’ll now find a logo, thanks to Heather Jacobs, a WWP regular. I couldn’t have done it alone. I’m no graphic designer. That was clear when I passed out a sheet of draft logos to workshop attendees one month and asked them what they thought, honestly. And they acted like the honest reviewers I had encouraged them to become. Read more »

Here are some pics from the “Mountain-lovin’, Tree-huggin’ Coffee Hour (and-a-half) Dec 13, cosponsored by the WWP and New Southerner Magazine. I hope to have podcasts up in a few weeks.

I now have digital merchandise. An e-book of my essays, an mp3, a writer’s guide. More to come. Try http://digiorders.the-wwp.com to get started.

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Louisville, KY – True stories, live music and great coffee will be served up at a special event to benefit Kentuckians For The Commonwealth.

The Mountain-Lovin,’ Tree-Huggin’ Coffee Hour (and-a-Half) will take place Sunday, Dec. 13, from 3 to 4:30 p.m. at the Glassworks 815 West Market Street, Louisville, KY.

“The event is free, but we are suggesting a minimum $5 donation,” said Michael Jackman, who heads the Writers Workshop Project. The event is being co-sponsored by the Writers Workshop Project and New Southerner Magazine. Read more »

Our “capital-I” is one of those bizarre inconsistencies of English orthography so taken for granted it’s all but unnoticed until someone points it out.

I made the discovery thanks to Maxine Hong Kingston’s essay, “The Language of Silence.” In a quick aside Kingston notes, ” ‘I’ is capital and ‘you’ is lower-case.” And suddenly I, too, recognized the fact that had been staring me in the face all these years: “I” is capital, and “you” is lower-case. And “we” is lower-case, and “he,” and “she” and “they” and “them” and “it,” and…every pronoun except “I.”

I’ve stated my belief elsewhere that American culture places too much emphasis on the Self in comparison to other cultures. The obvious reasons are America’s much-touted “pioneer spirit,” “immigrant motivation,” and “cowboy culture.” But maybe the real cause and effect of our culture’s narcissism is its capitalized first person pronoun. (Tell me, Aussies are rugged individualists, but aren’t Brits conformists by stereotype? Well, as you’ll see, they had the lower case for a long period and we never had it.)

Our English “I” stands alone among the languages for getting such capital treatment. In French, it’s “je,” in Spanish, “yo,” in Portuguese, “eu,” in German, “ich,” in Italian, “io“. (Though Italians capitalize the formal you, “Loro” – but that’s simply to avoid confusion with “loro” for “they”).
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I don’t know if I’d ever go so far as to recommend writers study linguistics, but it sure can’t hurt, and learning about the strange history and structure of English could help one become a better writer. So it’s worth a shot.

Here’s a loose collection of thoughts on linguistics, ending with why writers should be interested in it, and why the French referred to Americans as “les sommambiches” for thirty years after World War One.

English has secrets. For instance, the word bonfire comes from “bone fire.” If you didn’t study etymology, you wouldn’t ever know that buried in that happy term conjuring burning driftwood, surf, teenage yearning, and Beach Boys songs is a way the Celts warded off evil spirits. Read more »