TerrieMiller.com

I went to hear Natalie Goldberg speak at our local bookstore today. A few weeks ago I “discovered” her classic book on writing, Writing Down the Bones: Freeing the Writer Within and have been reading it. I was surprised when my friend TJ told me she was going to be in town promoting her new book, Old Friend from Far Away: The Practice of Writing Memoir.

I jotted down some quick notes and quotes from her talk:

“A writer has to be willing to be disturbed.” She went on to say that a writer can’t control the reactions of others. This is a big issue for me personally…what will they think if I tell the truth? And of course, anything less than the truth is unsatisfying. Goldberg said that she lost a lot of friends with The Great Failure, and “I also grew up and became my own authority with that book,” which of course made me interested in it.

She noted that “Writing is an act of compassion” because it’s an act of where another person feels what you have felt.

On how she has changed over the years since Writing Down the Bones, Goldberg said that she no longer believes that writing will save her. She also notes that you can’t tell people this when they’re starting out writing.

Someone asked what books she liked, and she named several; here were some I thought sounded interesting:

The Song Of The Lark (Signet Classics)

Stoner (New York Review Books Classics)

Waiting for the Barbarians (Penguin Great Books of the 20th Century)

Giovanni’s Room

It’s a great treat to be able to walk a couple blocks from home and meet up with friends for something like this…Copperfield’s is a jewel of a bookstore. I’m thinking about buying tickets for a benefit they’re hosting where Thomas Moore will speak about his new book, A Life at Work: The Joy of Discovering What You Were Born to Do. How could I not go to something with a title like that?!