Bobbi Ann Duffy, click
here to update your pages on AuthorsDen.
Blogs by Bobbi Ann Duffy
God Save Me From Myself. 10/4/2009 7:09:12 PM
I'm sure some of you have been wondering where I disappeared to. Well, no where really. I just can't seem to find enough hours in the day to do everything I have to or want to do.
School work is taking up a great deal of time. I'm taking only one graduate course, Principles and Problems of Literarty Study. The professor gave us a break by only assigning eight books instead of the nine he wanted to. I have three papers to do for that class, paper one was on John Updike. I did mine on the antisocial behavior of one of Updikes characters. The second is on Christopher Marlowe and the third will be on Robert Browning. The other class I'm taking is undergraduate. It's a poetry workshop. Easy for me you might think, think again. I have a professor that thinks every poem needs to have a hidden meaning, symbolism, or make a social statement. No story poems, fantasy poems, humorous poems etc. etc. etc.
I'm slightly hamstrung by the limitations, but I'm doing my best. Because it's an undergraduate class, there are only two of us who want to be writers. the rest are just filling in spaces for credit and thought it would be an easy A.
There in lies one of my problems. I don't remember who said "A little knowledge is a dangerous thing," but he was right. Not only do most of the students make indiscribably stupid comments, they don't take constructive criticism at all well. Those of you who know me and my work know that I am never offended by constructive criticism of my work, no do I ever attack another writer. If there is something I think a writer needs to know I contact them privately, not publically, and offer only a suggestion. Imagine if you will, someone qestioning my right to suggest to a poet that the reason she couldn't make the transition she was trying to make was not due to lack of talent, (Yes, I told her she was talented) but from lack of experience in writing in the form that was assigned and someone else saying, "What right do you have to question her experience?" under his breathe of course.
In the midst of all this there was added two new kittens to my life, my apartment being painted, and trying to put together the manuscript for my second poetry book, and you can see where I've been. Nowhere, fast!
Now that the painting is done, the kittens are settled and I have a handle on my studies, I hope to be up on AD more often. It will probably be in the middle of the night, but have patience and I'll be here as often as I can.
I'll let you know about my book as soon as I get it all figured out.
You'll can always write me at bduffy.fau.edu. I'd love to hear from any of you.
