April Reading; “Writing Your Way Out”

It’s rough out there. Besides being a tricky logistical time*, the economy has been destabilized by repeated drastic changes to international trade, civil rights for immigrants and political dissidents face a string of high-profile assaults, and the immediate consequences of any of these actions remains unclear. These are the kinds of months in which I often struggle with the question of how useful my work is to the present moment and macro needs of the people I love. 

But how useful is it to myself? Charlie Jane Anders book on the way writing is a substantial act of care for oneself was recommended by a Patron (currently on the leaderboard with 3 Reading List Recommendations!), and in the end it has been delivered at an opportune moment. 

*If you ever wondered “how much progress could a person make on their taxes in the slim breaks between performances of being a Facilitator at Undersigned on tour?” then your straits have been as desperate as mine, and I’m afraid I have bad news for both of us.

Never Say You Can't Survive; How to Get Through Hard Times by Making Up Stories

Charlie Jane Anders 

At once an instructional guide on the challenges of writing as craft and a testament to the power of writing as practice, Anders book is a welcome dose of perspective and peace.

Related Readings

Beyond Gender: Transition is a Part of Life (ft. Torrey Peters)

The Sam Sanders Show, March 21st

One thread of Anders writing is her candid reflections on trans experiences, both individually and politically in America. On reading these, I couldn’t help thinking of this interview Sam Sanders did with author Torrey Peters, whose phenomenal collection Stag Dance is currently keeping my bedside table competitive for my attention. In the interview, Peters talks about her interest in framing transness as an invitation, and not just an identity, and on writing characters who mostly do not identify as trans but are having trans experiences. Peters also discusses the ways that writing these stories (in one case in an entirely unfamiliar dialect) in turn gave her new ways of understanding and expressing her own experiences, and how those characters challenged her to reexamine ways she related to her closest friends. 

Writing Prompt

From the NYUAD Headless Society, as founded by Nishant Mohanchandra 

An unconventional pick, but since we’re talking about the power of writing, it seemed wrong that all the recommendations this month be reading. As such, I’m sharing my favorite ever writing prompt from the creative writing club in my university, which was named in honor of an Emily Dickinson quote*.

To attempt this in true Headless Fashion, I’d recommend you borrow our constraints:

• Don't read the prompt until you're ready to begin

• Get something physical to write with and on

• set a timer for 7 minutes

• make your best effort to not stop writing to think

Okay, ready at the starting/opening line of the page?

The prompt:

Imagine tomorrow morning a complete stranger was going to be dropped into your head; while they have a basic familiarity with the human experience, they have no knowledge of who you are, what matters to you, or even what you do for a living. Write them a set of instructions that would tell them how to be You for the day, with as little discernible difference as possible.

Enjoy! I think if you approach the topic with some lightness and proceed faster than you think, you'll find it accomplishes one of the things Charlie Jane Anders enjoys so much about writing; discovering the capacity to surprise yourself. If you give it a try, let me know in the comments how it felt!

*“If I read a book and it makes my whole body so cold no fire can warm me, I know that is poetry. If I feel physically as if the top of my head were taken off, I know that is poetry. These are the only ways I know it. Is there any other way?”

― Emily Dickinson, letter to T. W. Higginson, 16 August 1870