19 Gifts for Writers – Craft Your Content’s 2019 Holiday Gift Guide

Writers’ Rough Drafts – Episode #63 With Audley Puglisi

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Audley Puglisi is a playwright and poet. Cutting his teeth on the acting side of theater, he decided to step away from the stage when he started studying at Oberlin College, where he majored in Africana Studies. After a particularly insightful course on African and black performances, and some encouragement from his professors, he decided to look into playwriting. After school, he worked at community theaters like the Penumbra Theatre in St. Paul, Minnesota, while also working diligently on his own scripts. 

Eventually, he took the leap and applied for The Voices of Our Nations Arts Foundation (or VONA) fellowship, and was awarded a coveted spot. Since then, he has landed a residency at the Blue Mountain Center in Blue Mountain Lake, New York, and a Lambda Literary Fellowship. He currently is studying for a Master’s in Fine Arts at Yale University, and he had his New York City workshop debut with his show “Blues for Miss Lucille,” a Lorraine Hansberry Playwriting Award finalist.

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Don’t Fear the Blank Page: You’re Not an Impostor

The cursor blinks like it’s accusing you of not being a writer, not being able to communicate with the written word. Oh, if only you were in front of a group of people, you’d have no trouble chatting and getting to the topic you want to discuss. Maybe you’d feel more comfortable on stage, before a mic’d podium, with throngs of faces watching you with anticipation. Maybe you’d thrive there.

But there’s something about a blank page, about that cursor waiting with the same expectation as that sea of quiet and open faces that causes your whole system to go into deer-in-headlights mode. 

As a teacher, part of my job—and when it works, it’s one of those beautiful eureka moments that I live to witness—is to help my students get their ideas out of their head. Many of my students confuse the struggle of penning their thoughts with not having ideas, or not having good ideas. One of the most common questions my composition students come to me with is: How do I draft?

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Writers’ Rough Drafts – Episode #62 With Anne Janzer

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Anne Janzer is a writer, award-winning author, book and writing coach, and marketing consultant. With a background in working with over 100 tech companies, her original book, Subscription Marketing: Strategies for Nurturing Customers in a World of Churn, was written to help marketers manage nurture content in the world of SaaS and subscription-based services, an industry that has massively benefited from keeping customers on board rather than constantly having to seek out new ones. 

Working with writers and marketers in this space for so long, she began to realize that what many of them needed was a guide to help them communicate more effectively. Hence her next best-selling book (and my summer of 2019 favorite book read), The Writer’s Process: Getting Your Brain in Gear, which combines her decades of writing experience with a deep dive into the cognitive science behind the writing process, with some great philosophical and mythological takes thrown in as well. 

Her latest title, Writing to Be Understood: What Works and Why, focuses on the craft and science of nonfiction writing. And you know how we love the craft of content and writing around here! In addition to her informative yet super enjoyable reads on the writing process, Anne also has created a number of online courses to help writers communicate and improve their productivity, while also becoming a sought-after keynote speaker and conference fixture.

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