My mother is my biggest inspiration. She has been writing for several years, and long before I ever was...but she has always encouraged my writing, even before I knew I wanted to become a writer. She has shown me how to submit things, how to write queries, how to format, and how to write. I've learned 90% of everything I know about writing from her, and I owe her a tremendous amount! Just by supporting me, she makes me want to write more, and she never tells me something is good unless she really thinks it is. That's the most important thing to me. Thank you Mom

Writing Inspirations

Aside from my Mom and my sister there are different Authors, and/or poets who have influenced my writing a great deal.

Ernest Hemingway

Mr.Hemingway has played a large role in how I write emotion. He wrote human emotion in a very believable way. Vulnerability, jealousy, love and hate...all for the reasons that people have them. "The Sun Also Rises" is a book he wrote partially based on some of his personal experiences. While a great deal of the book takes place at a bullfighting festival in Spain, a sport I have utter contempt for and that shows on my Animal Rights page, the characters themselves I find fascinating. The way Hemingway wrote them...for the most part, people whom you would never want to know or meet. The heroine of the book is selfish, overly dramatic, and completely manipulative...the men, almost as bad. Yet, I can't help but keep turning the page to read more. Hemingway's writing inspired me, and also taught me that you do not have to write characters people will like, or even you like. And...you can have more than one unlikable character :-)

"The Papa Page" (above picture courtesy of "The Papa Page")

Alfred Lord Tennyson

Lord Tennyson is my favorite poet by far. I have read the poetry of many poets, and out of all of them, he is the strongest driving force in any poetry I write. I only hope that one day I can achieve some of the detail, and continuity that he had in his writing. My favorite poem...of his, and in general is "The Charge Of The Light Brigade". It illustrates patriotism, and war in a few verses, what I always pictured it to be.

"The Tennyson Page" (Above picture courtesy of "The Tennyson Page")

There are three other people in writing that I admire very very much.

Dorothy Parker. A wonderful, and very witty poet. You can find a link to her in the "Insomniacs Poetry Beanbag". She had a quick mind, and a biting humor about her that I can't help but love. If it was a cynical, funny poem, she probably wrote it, and if she didn't...they copied her!

Picture courtesy of Chicago Public Library and New Standard Encyclopedia.

Oscar Wilde. He wrote "The Importance of Being Earnest," among many other things. He too had a great, witty mind about him. I love wit and I love people who can write it even more. Oscar Wilde was a very controversial man. He had his run ins with the law...he was a very tall and noticeable sort of a person (no, him being tall AND having run in's with the law have nothing to do with each other)...and all in all, I like him quite a bit. You can find links for him in "The Theatre" and "The Insomniacs Poetry Beanbag."

Paula Vogel. She is a playwright, you may or may not have heard of. She wrote the pulitzer prize winning play, "How I learned To Drive." When I first started thinking about playwriting, I began reading other plays. I rented a copy of Theater Yearbook at the public library and it had "How I Learned To Drive" in it. I was so...moved, I suppose is the closest I can pin it. That play, that story, and the way that it was written touched me. I think of Paula Vogel as my modern playwriting inspiration. There are many playwrights out there who have written the classics, most of whom have passed away, and there are a few still alive and working today such as Arthur Miller. However, when you connect with a work, with the person who wrote something..that's special. I connected somehow with "How I Learned To Drive" and have since paid close attention to Miss Vogel's career. To follow in her footsteps would be an honor and I look up to her.

I am also inspired by many other things...not just people. It can be how sunny it is out one day, or how cloudy the next...it can be a certain color, or even the way somebody acts. You just never know. The best part of inspiration is that it effects everyone differently. I enjoy these writers...and you may equally dislike them, and in return the people or things that inspire you , might not do a thing for me. But it is wonderful to see what inspiration will create.

I put a piece of paper under my pillow, and when I could not sleep, I wrote in the dark.

Henry David Thoreau