HALLIE EPHRON: It’s WHAT WE’RE WRITING WEEK, and after a long dry spell during which I’ve been doing a lot of teaching and a lot less writing, I do have some progress to report. No, I haven’t finished the novel I’m working on, though I am working on it (in fits and starts).
Here’s how they described the year-long position:
The WIR is an aspiring or published writer who furthers the Library’s fundamental mission by using their time to create an original piece of work and sharing their expertise through creating and offering library programming.
The position is funded by a generous legacy from Herb Voigt, a brilliant biomedical engineer with an astonishing list of accomplishments from research to teaching to academic leadership to civic service to beekeeping. Like my husband Jerry, Dr. Voigt went to City College and I would love to have asked him whether they crossed paths when Dr. Voigt was a student and Jerry was a TA teaching introductory physics and getting his PhD.
And the more I thought about it, the more I realized that I'd love the opportunity to spend a year taking my writing in a new direction and connecting with local writers and readers through my library.
So I applied. In the process, thinking about what kind of “original work” I’d want to attempt. Here’s what I proposed:
I’m interested in using the year to take a step away from the suspense/mystery novels I’ve been known for and create a collection of thought pieces that share my own journey, growing up in a family of writers but for decades insisting that I was not a writer.
I went on...
For decades I insisted that I was not a writer. My parents were writers. My three sisters were writers. I was a teacher who lived in the suburbs and drove my kids to soccer practice. I wasn't a writer because I didn't write, and it wasn’t until I was into my forties that I finally started to wonder if I could. I began with essays, figuring hey, I've got opinions. How hard can it be?
Now anyone who's tried to write essays knows how naive that is, but sometimes it's better not to know. National Public Radio took one of my first efforts, a piece about growing up a closet athlete in the years before Title IX funded girls' sports, and I was on my way. Reading it in the NPR recording studio for Bill Littlefield’s "It’s Only a Game" remains a highlight of my writing career.
So now I’m waiting for the library to announce 2023-4 Dr. Herb Voigt Memorial Writer in Residence. But the good news is that the applying gave me a kick start in a new direction and a project that it feels exactly right for me to tackle at this point in my career. (Thanks, Dr. Voigt!)
