Where and how to write when you can't be ‘The Madwoman in the Attic’

Writer and professor Ellen Tsagaris is the author of "Writer as Researcher" in the MWC Creative Writing

Dr. Ellen Tsagaris

Primer (MWC Press, 2012). She is also a blogger, doll curator and a lifelong poet. She has written over sixty articles and two study guides/texts. Sappho, I should have listened is a chapbook of her poetry, and she is also the author of The Subversion of Romance in the Novels of Barbara Pym (1998, Popular Press) and A Bibliography of Doll and Toy Sources (American dollmuseum.org, 2011). Last year, she served as editor for The Legend of Tug Fest and other LeClaire Ghost Stories (918studio, 2012).   @DrEsDollMuseum

It was about six years ago, and I was trying to enter a writing contest, and a very scholarly one at that.  It had to do with Virginia Woolf's A Room of Ones' Own, a piece I knew like the back of my hand.  The contest called for lesson plans based on Room; easy!  Right!  Wrong!  Though I had taught, read, studied, written about, viewed, and reviewed Room dozens of times, my mind went blank.  I couldn't come up with anything, and got cold and hot at the same time just thinking about it. This wasn't just a case of writers block; it was mind block.  I had forgotten everything.  THE ROUTINE as I called the daily grind for me had eaten up my writing capabilities.  Why?  I thought I was washed up, done, before I'd even started.  My unfinished manuscripts called to me; I couldn't answer.  I looked around at the "writing stations" I had tried to carve out for myself, the bedroom desk piled with reference books, the living room computer station, my trusty lap desks, the writing board I used at my parents, even my old 386 computer.  Nothing called to me.  It was a challenge  trying to get the correct writing atmosphere.  Then it hit me; I needed just to write.  Anywhere.  On anything.  There was no magic room, or pen.  Like many writers, I dreamed of being The Madwoman in the Attic, with my own vintage roll top desk, and a laptop, and file cabinets for all my carefully sorted manuscripts.  My pencils would always be sharp, but the sharpener would never be far behind.  I would have inspirational  words written all over the attic, the way Anne Rice wrote words on her study walls in the house on First Street.  I would have writing costumes, my first editions and signed books nearby, my reference books and dissertation research all handy.  And, if this fantasy really took hold of me, I would never write because I’d never have the necessary space and props.

I took Woolf's title too much to heart; she didn't literally mean a "room.”  She meant finding time to write and the courage to seize the moment.

So I took a page from Barbara Pym's book, and like her, I started to carry around little notebooks for ideas.  I wrote words I liked, ideas, character sketches.  Sometimes I taped in things I cut out.  I started stories and novels.  I keep these little books and go back to them.   They keep me from losing good thoughts and ideas.  If I really don't have a little book handy, I jot notes in calendars, on margins, on scraps I tear off of envelopes and napkins, and on Post Its.  I tend to keep my Post Its, usually in pretty tins.  I've put them together like puzzles to create entire essays, sort of a literary Mah Jong. 

The little notes helped. So did getting my Netbook, pink and cute as it is.  Now, I could write anywhere, and I do.  I make my inspiration and materials portable.  I like to write outside on my patio on quiet days, when it is cool enough to be comfortable but sunny enough to see.  I write on a wooden TV tray in my living room, surrounded by all my books, collections, family photos and things I love.  Sometimes, when it is very hot, I go downstairs to the carpeted hallway of my basement, and set up said TV tray and my favorite green camp chair.  It  is a good place to edit, and to find solitude.  I write in cafes and coffee houses; usually I work on longer projects there, and maybe bookmark Internet research.  Libraries are OK; but I'm usually there to do research, or to browse their salesrooms.  It seems harder to concentrate in libraries for me.  I could only study productively in my law school library. To this day, I couldn't say why.

I  work on several projects at once; I read for one, edit one, research for one, write a draft, write a chapter.  This keeps me fresh, and sometimes one project informs another, or reminds me of what I need to do an another.  Because my mind is occupied with new and various things, I don't get stuck or bored.

I also blog.  Some writers warn us away from blogging; they say it is a way to waste time, when we should be turning out a manuscript.  For me, it is a warm up exercise.  My ideas are born in blogs; some are tried out as excerpts on my blogs.  I also like to read blogs to get ideas;  sources may need to be checked, but the writing is fresh, honest, written by someone who cares.  Blogs give me confidence.  I can see who is reading them, and as the number of viewers grows, so does my sense of accomplishment.

So, I write everywhere.  When I can.  On a lot of things.  The world is now my "room."  That dreamy space in the attic?  If I ever get it, I'll use it for sleeping.

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MWC Creative Writing Primer Kindle Giveaway June 27-29! #collinsconference

MWC Creative Writing Primer coming in May

Coming May 2012

Writers and workshop instructors affiliated with the Midwest Writing Center have collaborated on The Midwest Writing Center Creative Writing Primer to be released as an ebook by MWC Press in May.  The Primer includes author perspectives on the essentials necessary to a creative writing practice and offers a diverse and insightful guide for the beginning to emerging creative writer. The Primer is dedicated to Evelyn Witter, MWC co-founder, who taught creative writing basics for more than 30 years.

Primer contributing authors include Julia Coleman, Stephen Frech, Sally John, Max Molleston, Trisha Nelson, Steven Semken, Robin Throne, Jodie Toohey, Ellen Tsagaris, and Connie (Corcoran) Wilson. Sarah Throne-Ploehn of Rivertown Creative & Co. contributed the cover and interior design.

Participants in MWC’s online Creative Writing Basics I & II workshops will receive the Primer included in their workshop registration, and the ebook will also be sold separately by MWC (more details forthcoming).

The Midwest Writing Center will begin accepting applications for the 2012 Collins Poetry Residency May 1st

The Midwest Writing Center will begin accepting applications on May 1st for the month-long Collins Poetry Residency that will take place in April 2012. The Collins Poetry Residency was established in honor of Richard, Susan and Ryan Collins for their contributions to and encouragement of local poets.

The resident poet will facilitate at least one public reading, workshop, online poetry forum, and launch a limited edition broadside publication. The resident poet will be selected based on their writing resume, five representative poems, and their purpose statement.  Applicants must be residents in one of the following counties: Illinois’ Henry, Mercer, or Rock Island counties, or Iowa’s Clinton, Muscatine, or Scott counties. Applications will be accepted from May 1 until August 31.

The chosen poet will work under the guidance of poet Dr. Ellen Tsagaris. Tsagaris is a college professor and an advocate for community based poetry. She has written poetry since childhood and her poetry has appeared in several periodicals. Her chapbook of poetry “Sappho, I Should Have Listened” was released in April 2011 by 918studio. If you have questions abou the residency, please call or email the MWC at 563-324-1410 or mwc@midwestwritingcenter.org

918studio releases Tsagaris’ "Sappho, I should have listened"

Sappho, I should have listened, a collection of poetry by Rock Island native and writer, Ellen Tsagaris, was released today by 918studio. The chapbook is Tsagaris’ first collection of poetry. Cover design for the collection was by Decker Ploehn II of Rivertown Creative, a design cooperative of sarahthronedesign.com and deckerploehndesign.com.
Tsagaris will read from her collection at a chapbook launch party and book signing to be held from 4-6 p.m. on Saturday, April 23, at the Midwest Writing Center. The event will be held in the third floor conference room of the Bucktown Center of the Arts at 225 East 2^nd Street, Davenport. The public is invited and refreshments will be available.  

Tsagaris is a Quad Cities area college professor and an advocate for community-based poetry. She has written poetry since childhood and her work has appeared in several periodicals. She will also serve as mentor for the 2012 Collins Poetry Residency, an annual competition that allows a regional poet to serve in residence at the Midwest Writing Center in support of community-based poetry during National Poetry Month.

Roald Tweet of Rock Island Lines, WVIK 90.3fm, had early praise for Sappho: “In the title poem for this collection, Ellen Tsagaris muses that she should have listened to Sappho (a reference to her Greek roots). Fortunately, she did not. She realizes, as she says in the poem, ‘River Lines,’ the wine-dark seas and white beaches are not for her. Her heart, her inspiration, and her home is the Mississippi with its beer-colored water and its gritty, graveled banks. Rather than the flute and pan pipes of high poetry, she brings a whole orchestra of instruments: praise, parody, satire, romance, irony, awe, metrical and free verse. Perhaps Sappho should have listened to Ellen Tsagaris.”

Sappho, I should have listened is available for purchase at the Midwest Writing Center and on Amazon.com.