About Mary Sojourner

Mary Sojourner at the Grand Canyon National ParkWriting is as personal as desire – and as uncontrollable. Words are my road trip, volatile lover, relentless boss, weapon, and instant transport out of where I do not want to be. Most often when I write, I walk a lifeline between intuition and discipline. Without the first, the stories are dead on the page; without the second, my reader would be lured into lush and meaningless chaos. I am afraid – always – that when I sit down to write that the words will be gone.

I learned to write by reading. My childhood was periodically terrifying. There were two shelters: books and the outdoors. I was the serious child who carried six books home from the library, and came back the next morning, every book read. Scheherazade, in the 1001 Arabian Nights taught me that stories could save a person’s life. As long as there was a book to read, I could sleep peacefully no matter the family chaos. As long as I could escape into the woods near our house, I would be safe till it was time for reading.

Mary Sojourner can help you with your Creative Writing

When I was twelve, my mother gave me a book of Dorothy Parker’s poems. A month later, I sent my first submission – a poem in the style of Dorothy Parker – to The New Yorker. When the form rejection came, I tacked it on my bedroom wall. It was proof. I was a real writer.

Now I teach the same way I write. I pay attention to story, then craft. You choose from my cabinet of tools and techniques. You try them out. We discover what works for you – and we discover what is missing in your writing life, not just when you’re at your computer and with your notebook, but in the whole of your life. We are in relationship with our writing as we are in relationship with our lives.

 

“The Map of How to Write” by Mary Sojourner

 

On Writing

Up Near Pasco

It happened up near Pasco, Washington. My aunt calls from Burns to tell me. “Jinella, I got some sad news. Kyrin laid himself down on the railroad tracks up near Pasco and got hit. Far as the cops could tell, he had his music plugged in his ears, you know how the kids do…and his… … more >>>

The Map of How to Write

The Map of How to Write

I FINISH MY READING at a Southwestern Writers’ Conference. I have spoken about crippling pain from a hiking fall and seeing a dust cloud from the Gobi Desert turn the sun moon-silver over the Black Rock, and how a volcanic out-cropping seen against sunset can become figures from a Javanese shadow play. A woman in… … more >>>

Recent Postings

BTW repost from 12/6/2022

At the moment, I’m feeling less than inspirational due to a Double Whammy, make that Quintuple: I’ve had to go off caffeine; I’m blocked from my medicinal walking due to a badly bruised left knee; I have seasonal affective disorder; the freaking American “holidays” have thudded down on us; and –  this might be the… … more >>>

You hold the map to your writing BTW repost from 9/1/2022

Look down at your hands. A simple instruction. Now, close your eyes and look down at your hands. Imagine that you write about a person who cannot see. Your person has just set foot on a trail they cannot see. And they are determined to walk on that trail. The details you bring to this… … more >>>

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