In "Say Cheese", a section of Bernard Cooper's Maps To Anywhere, he discusses the idea of photography. How photography, above all else, has survived through many years. Decades. Why?

Perhaps it is the need to remember and be remembered - photos allows us to immortalize ourselves forever more. "Take a picture, it'll last longer," they say, and it's true. While we may die, pictures last forever. And perhaps this caters to a desire to live forever or to be forever remembered; we want future people to look back at photos and see us and know we existed.

Photography is also displayed as a connection between peoples - it is used all over the world. People in all kinds of countries utilize photography or, at the least, know what it is. Everybody shares this desire to turn our memories into something tangible so we can hold onto them forever.

Maps to Anywhere

In class we have been discussing the idea of the creative essay. Something real told in the form of fiction, with immense detail and imagery. The stories are memories of the authors - they are real, they are things that you can't make up.

Bernard Cooper's Maps to Anywhere is like that. In my mind, the book is merely a series of creative essays - each one with its own title and story. My current favorite is By Any Other Name. This section tells of Cooper's childhood shenanigans with his friends, in which they would prank call names they found in the phonebook. Cooper discusses their obsession with syntax and alliteration - says they were more "poets than pranksters". This, I think, is true of all people. Language is the root of everything - we get a thrill from words being arranged a certain way. Some words sound funny, some sound serious. Most jokes are told with language in mind - there's always a pun or a twisting of words. We are human, and I think humans are poets above all else - even if they don't realize it.

Goldberg: Claim Your Writing

In Goldberg's Writing Down the Bones, there is a section on claiming your writing. In the first part, entitled Use Loneliness, she discusses literally using your own loneliness to write. She suggests writing with the purpose of connecting to another human being - and I find that to be good advice. Oftentimes we think that writing is therapeutic if we only write it for ourselves - but are we truly getting it out of us if no one else is reading it? Similarly, if we have certain feelings, we won't be rid of them unless we talk to someone about them. There is no release, no catharsis, if no one is there to listen.


In another part called A Story Circle, Goldberg suggests getting some friends together and having a writing circle, where you suggest a prompt such as "tell us a story you love to tell," and write about it. I really like this idea, and plan to utilize it in the future. Also in this segment, Goldberg says to "write how you talk, nothing fancy." I feel that this is important, as the stories I enjoy most are the ones written in a believable voice. The ones written in a voice I can relate to, casual and real. I think that is an important piece of advice.