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Led Zeppelin's Stairway to Heaven …
My interpretation of the lyrics to Stairway to Heaven. (posted March 4, 2022)
Dos and Don'ts …
A New York Times compilation of tips from famous writers. (posted July 5, 2019)
Silly People …
A flash memoir published in Write On Down Town 2019. (posted April 26, 2019)
Five Poems …
A group of short works in progress. (posted April 21, 2019)
Systems Theory and Biblical Creation …
An old essay I wrote that has been on a different website. (posted April 6, 2019)
The Economics of Jesus …
I posted a new essay explaining the historical basis of Jesus. (posted September 12, 2018)
Author's quotes …
A 2012 compilation of 30 Indispensable Writing Tips From Famous Authors. (posted October 22, 2017)
The Count …
I posted a new short story in fiction titled The Count. (posted September 5, 2017)
The Moment …
My novella titled “The Moment” is now available in print and on Kindle. (posted June 22, 2017)
Author's page …
I set up an author's page on Amazon at Amazon.com/author/mtmartin. (posted June 22, 2017)
Amazon Kindle …
On a whim, I made some of my poetry and short stories available as ebooks on Amazon. (posted May 27, 2017)
New poem …
I added a new poem, The Man And The Moon, about remembering a lost love. (posted May 14, 2017)
Sharlette's Web …
I added this short story to the fiction section. (posted May 2, 2017)
New additions …
I added a poem, The Hangar, and revised the short story formerly titled "One Man's Journey Into Night", retitling it "The Journey". (posted April 25, 2017)
How to revise …
Literary Hub has a collection of 12 Contemporary Writers On How They Revise their work in progress. (posted January 20, 2017)
Links page …
I changed the links page to link to YouTube and other things I had done, including revised versions of two Christmas stories originally posted on the children's humor website I built in 1996. (posted January 1, 2017)
My Vietnam War Adventures …
I added a collection of anecdotes about my experiences in the Vietnam War circa 1969.
Emotional Story Arcs …
The MIT Technology Review summarized research in an article titled
Data Mining Reveals the Six Basic Emotional Arcs of Storytelling
The six basic emotional arcs are:
- A steady, ongoing rise in emotional valence, as in a rags-to-riches story such as Alice's Adventures Underground by Lewis Carroll
- A steady ongoing fall in emotional valence, as in a tragedy such as Romeo and Juliet
- A fall then a rise, such as the man-in-a-hole story, described by Kurt Vonnegut as "boy meets girl, boy loses girl, boy gets girl."
- A rise then a fall, such as the Greek myth of Icarus
- A rise-fall-rise, such as Cinderella
- A fall-rise-fall, such as Oedipus
(click image to toggle size
(posted November 11, 2015)
Theodor Geisel, Dr. Seuss, …
According to the book A Curious Mind, Geisel had his first book rejected 27 times and gave up.
Geisel says he was walking home, stinging from [that] twenty-seventh rejection, with the manuscript and drawings for Mulberry Street under his arm, when an acquaintance from his student days at Dartmouth College bumped into him on the sidewalk on Madison Avenue in New York City. Mike McClintock asked what Geisel was carrying. "That's a book no one will publish," said Geisel. "I'm lugging it home to burn." McClintock had just that morning been made editor of children's books at Vanguard; he invited Geisel up to his office, and McClintock and his publisher bought Mulberry Street that day. Geisel would later say of meeting McClintock on the street, "[I]f I'd been going down the other side of Madison Avenue, I'd be in the dry-cleaning business today. …"
(posted July 27, 2015)
Harper Lee …
Lee explains how friends funded her time to write "To Kill A Mockingbird." There is a gadget in the upper right to control the page. Source
(posted February 3, 2015)
Philip Roth and Sexism …
A feminist's iconoclastic critique of Roth's portrayal of women, especially in Sabbath's Theater and The Human Stain.
(posted March 16, 2015)
My Website…
I decided I needed a place to post my fiction writing. So here it is. Big whoop.
(posted January 28, 2015)
Website up without text…
The inside pages have a lot of my material ready, but the home page is still under construction.
(posted January 28, 2015)
Eventually there will be interesting stuff…
I find interesting stuff about writing all the time but have no way to pass it on. Now I do. Now I can't find anything.
(posted January 28, 2015)
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