Ernest Hemingway Archives - Page 2 of 4 - grace grits and gardening

Hemingway’s Barn

December 26, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner 5 Comments

Stories that waited for paper now wait for me.

With so much to say, I search for a worthy beginning. Thoughts that swirled and drifted through dreams, now hide just out of reach.

Inside this barn, I am filled with something greater. I am filled with possible.

Through the windowpane, I gaze into a towering matt of dark green leaves. Trees inspire and shade and watch over me, the same trees that watched him too.

My thoughts are safe inside this space. I am free to explore, free to wonder and wander. The air is full of potential.

A ray of sunshine splits the canopy and brightens my writing table.

Dust motes dance.

In the distance, a train rumbles, then and now.

He said there is nothing to writing. Just sit down at the typewriter and bleed.

And so I bleed.

talya

Grace Grits and Gardening

Farm. Food. Garden. Life.

Hemingway’s Barn won 2nd place in the 2013 White County Creative Writer’s competition for the category “Favorite Writing Place”.

For information on Hemingway’s Barn and the Hemingway-Pfeiffer Museum and Educational Center, click HERE.

Living Outside Herself

November 18, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner 23 Comments

Each afternoon they chatted beside the warm fire.

He shared memories of his life as a young man, nearly century old memories.

She listened and sensed the man he once was when his life was full and productive.

Did you always want to be a traveling salesman?

No. I took whatever job came along after the war. I had to think of my wife and young kids. Did you always want to be a banker?

I never wanted to be a banker. I took whatever job came along after college.

Winter melted.

Soon he would leave.

As they sat together on the porch swing, he thought of yesterday.

She thought of something more.

She dared to imagine a different life.

Have you decided what you want to do when you grow up, he asked with a chuckle.

Write. I’ve always wanted to write. But change is scary, unfamiliar. She glanced to the trees searching for answers.

He nodded in agreement. When you start to live outside yourself, it’s all dangerous.

***

talya

Grace Grits and Gardening

Farm. Food. Garden. Life.

This post was written for Write Tribe – Hemingway prompt (weave a story or poem around a Hemingway quote…) “When you start to live outside yourself, it’s all dangerous.” – Ernest Hemingway, The Garden of Eden

Blogging Like Hemingway: 10 Simple Steps

October 13, 2013 By Talya Tate Boerner 25 Comments

grace grits and gardening blogging like Ernest Hemingway

Spending time at the Hemingway-Pfeiffer Educational Center in Piggott, Arkansas is magical bordering on spiritual. Ernest Hemingway, who won a Pultizer Prize in Literature for Old Man and the Sea, wrote a portion of A Farewell to Arms in the barn which he claimed as his writing studio. For a writer, this corner of Northeast Arkansas is sacred.

Hemingway wrote each morning before the day grew hot and sticky. I imagine he gazed out the window looking to the trees for inspiration. He strolled the grounds leaving behind the sweet aroma of his finest Cuban. He felt the ground vibrate as the train rumbled through downtown Piggott…

In my efforts to channel Hemingway, I’ve compiled a list of blogging tips based on his writing style and famous quotes.

1. Write short sentences. Write straight to the point.

2. Establish a writing routine, and write consistently.

3. Be sure to Make every word count. Use strong action verbs.

4. Don’t spoonfeed the reader. Write so your reader feels what you feel.

5. Write on the principle of the iceberg. For every visible part, seven-eighths is hidden underwater.

6. Edit. Edit. EDIT. Write 800 words. Eliminate 400 words.

7. Live life. Observe life.

8. Edit again.

9. Eliminate exclamation points! F. Scott Fitzgerald said exclamation points are like laughing at your own joke. Hemingway rarely used them.

10. End your daily writing while you still have something to say.