Katiaesque

  • Off to Hogwarts!

    Hey guys, Just letting you know it’s almost time. Two days, to be precise. Time to launch the third semester. Time to pack up my wand — um, I mean pen — my numerous notebooks, my thickest of sweaters. (Brrrrr!!!) Time to take the plane to Vermont College of Fine Arts– the secret snowy north place, where they teach magic.…

    Katia Raina

  • An Honest Promise of a Great Beginning

    With 2013 winding down, the New Year is almost upon us. I figure this is a pretty good time to talk about beginnings. Well, it’s my excuse, anyway! In a way I have been investigating beginnings my entire first year in VCFA — both through my critical and creative work. After two semesters, 100+ books…

    Katia Raina

  • HOW DID THEY DO THAT? Learning From The Best

    So I am about halfway through the Writing For Children And Young Adults program now — another year to go! — and last week I wrote my last Vermont College of Fine Arts essay. The realization makes me feel surprisingly wistful. The essays, anywhere from 3 to 10 pages long, were meant to help us tackle…

    Katia Raina

  • Not A Daily Writer 2: On Superheroes Versus Champions

    This is a follow-up post to my last rather embarrassing admission of not being a daily word count superhero anymore. Okay, maybe you guys didn’t think it was embarrassing, but I did! Allow me now to present the other side of the issue. Because ever since the last post, I’ve been thinking… It is true that…

    Katia Raina

  • Gasp! I Am Not A Daily Writer, After All

    Daily writing goals are alluring. They keep the writing brain in shape. They keep the writer satisfied: “Hey, look at me, I’m writing!”, keep the writer with the story. They feed the muse. It’s easy to feel productive that way — and to be productive, too. WHY IT’S NOT FOR EVERYONE (i.e. why it’s not for…

    Katia Raina

  • Mid-Semester Progress Report

    So, the whole slowing down and letting go thing? It took just under a month, both a hard-work month and a vacation of a month. Letting go meant songs on the piano, meant Friday night candles, movies, nothing grand. Slowing down meant looking up, looking left and right, too, just paying attention. Playing meant new rituals (and some old ones too),…

    Katia Raina

  • Blank Page Fears

    I am re-reading a wonderful book, The Creative Habit, by Twyla Tharp, a dancer and a choreographer. The book aims to help artists of any kind take control of their routine (so that within their writing hours, they can surrender to their art even more effectively). In the very first chapter Ms. Tharp talks about facing down…

    Katia Raina

  • The Hardest Homework

    I am smack in the middle of my second VCFA semester, and, along with a new essay, and the usual reading and writing, my wise teacher gave me the hardest, most impossible homework of all. She told me to stop working. 🙂         Not to stop writing, to stop working. So damn hard. She told me…

    Katia Raina

  • My Ideal Reader

    One of our VCFA teachers has her students write an essay about who their ideal reader is. She isn’t my teacher (I swear I wish I could have them all!), but I want to do this little exercise anyway. Just for fun. My ideal reader is 15 years old. Medium build, medium height, and she…

    Katia Raina

  • On Voice And Love

    Aaaaaah! How is it already August 20th? And how has it been a month? How? How? How? Okay, now that that’s out of the way, I bring you a long-promised nuggets-of-wisdom post from my last residency at the Vermont College of Fine Arts. While my first residency back in January got dubbed as “The Plague” residency,…

    Katia Raina