Recommended Reading
Reflections and Readings from My Bradbury Trio Program
The Bradbury Trio [reading a poem, an essay, and a story every day] fuels my writing.
This structure works for me because I am inspired to write after I read. It reminds me to read what I normally might not. There are hints of influence in the piece I write, but even if you read all the pieces in one sitting you may not be able to tell. What certain details in a poem or a story or an essay conjures up in my brain is based on my experience.
A podcast I listened to on Sunday referred to reading like a bee gathering from each flower in the field and then making their own unique honey with the writing that comes as a result.
I hope the reading you do today leads you to writing honey that could have not been created any other way.
Here are some of the texts that made an impact on me and I want to share with you.
Essays:
I love Jenny Rosenstrach’s cookbooks and learned this past weekend she has a Substack! She has a new cookbook coming out next year as well.
The act of cooking and reading about it has fueled my writing.
I have started to think about the poems, stories, and essays that I am reading daily as ingredients for the special writing meal I create.
Jenny does a post of Three Things that I find interesting and surprising.
Essay: Amy Hempel Interview for the Paris Review
I get obsessed with certain authors and I am in a deep Hempel rabbit hole. I am still obsessed with her story The Doll Tornado.
What I find fascinating about Hempel is that she focuses on her stories at a sentence level and how the following sentences responds to the one before.
Story: Hana Sushi SmokeLong Quarterly
I love a story told through an object and this is a great example. After the death of their grandfather, the characters feel they can eat sushi again. It is a beautiful unfolding of the reasons they couldn’t eat it when he was alive and the life he lived.
An object that keeps resurfacing this week for me is mirrors. I think I will put MIRROR at the top of the page, set the timer for 10 minutes and see what emerges.
Poem: New Delhi in Winter - Rohan Chhetri The Paris Review
This poem is one I read once and then started to write. When I came to a place where I didn’t know the next sentence in my own wiring, I reread the poem until I found a phrase and then used it as the beginning of my next sentence. In teaching, I refer to these as sentence stems. Most students can write if they are given a few words to begin with. I am no different.
The last word is LEAVE of this poem which has stuck with me for more than 24 hours. It is the word and that the poem ends with just one syllable. Something I am playing with in my writing these last few days.
WHAT HAVE YOU READ THAT RESONATES WITH YOU LATELY?
I don't think I've ever heard of the Bradbury Trip, but I love the concept!
I want to know more about this approach! How fascinating, the analogy of the bee gathering the pollen from flowers to make a nectar honey like a reader does with books - to flavor life with wildflowers and tupelo and all strains of colors. Have you read Pat Conroy's cookbook? If you like cookbooks with the backstories of recipes, his is one you might want to check out. It's fascinating how food shapes us - - not just literally shapes us in the physical caloric sense, but in the times around the table, in the kitchen, chewing on what's important in life with those important in our lives. Beautiful post!