{"id":6070,"date":"2011-11-22T15:09:40","date_gmt":"2011-11-22T23:09:40","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/barbarafalconernewhall.com\/?p=6070"},"modified":"2011-11-22T15:09:40","modified_gmt":"2011-11-22T23:09:40","slug":"the-writing-room-scholars-like-lauren-winner-who-know-how-to-write-for-the-rest-of-us","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/server.stagingweb3.net\/barbarafalconernewhall\/the-writing-room-scholars-like-lauren-winner-who-know-how-to-write-for-the-rest-of-us\/","title":{"rendered":"Lauren Winner: Seven Pithy Writing Tips From a Best-Selling Memoirist"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Memoirist<\/a>
Lauren Winner at The Glen Workshops in Santa Fe, 2009. Photo by BF Newhall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

By Barbara Falconer Newhall<\/em><\/p>\n

Lauren\u00a0Winner, author\u00a0of\u00a0\u00a0<\/em>the popular memoir Girl Meets God,<\/em> was\u00a0in San Francisco last weekend giving advice to religion scholars\u00a0on how to write books for a general audience.<\/p>\n

Lauren is an academic — she’s\u00a0assistant professor of Christian Spirituality at Duke Divinity School —\u00a0but much of\u00a0her advice to the scholars gathered for the American Academy of Religion conference last weekend applies\u00a0nicely to\u00a0us non-academic, learn-as-you-go writers.<\/p>\n

Lauren’s tips:<\/p>\n

1. Procrastination can work for you. Lauren wrote Girl Meets God<\/em> while a student. Writing is what she did when she couldn’t settle down\u00a0to study.<\/p>\n

2. Figure out who your audience is, write to that audience. Better yet, write to a real or imaginary specific person who embodies that audience.<\/p>\n

3. Good prose can make any topic interesting.\u00a0Improve your writing\u00a0by reading a lot in your genre. But make sure you’re reading well written prose, because it rubs off. Lauren likes Jill Lepore’s New Yorker writing.<\/p>\n

4. Start small. Aim big. Write for a\u00a0neighborhood newsletter. Work your way up the ladder to local newspapers\u00a0and\u00a0then to national magazines. Hope for the New Yorker.<\/p>\n

5. Buy books. It will help keep\u00a0the industry alive long enough to be there for you when your book is ready.<\/p>\n

\"The<\/a>
Lots of books displayed at the 2011 AAR and SBL conference. Photo by BF Newhall<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

6. When you send out your proposal, send along a photo of yourself.<\/p>\n

7. When your book is published, spend a couple thousand dollars — if you can — to buy copies\u00a0to send to key members of your core audience. She sent one of hers to college chaplains at Christian colleges.<\/p>\n

Some\u00a0other\u00a0scholar-author types joined Lauren on the panel, which was sponsored by Publishers Weekly. My wise and\u00a0fun-loving Religion Newswriters Association colleague, Marcia Z. Nelson, moderated.<\/p>\n

Michael Coogan of Harvard University\u00a0suggested refining your writing style and building a readership by talking to groups. He also noted that it’s OK to write a book that’s already\u00a0been written (including the ones\u00a0you’ve written yourself) because, “There are always new audiences.”<\/p>\n

Phil Zuckerman of Pitzer College, recommended investing in an alarm clock. Budget time to write,\u00a0then\u00a0write till the alarm goes off.<\/p>\n

Kirstin Swenson of the University of Virginia reminds us that “You gotta write what you want to write.”<\/p>\n

You can read another story about Lauren at “A Week With Lauren Winner<\/a>.”\u00a0 For more writing tips, check out “The Toxic Reader”<\/a> with Jane Anne Staw.
\n<\/em><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

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