Wednesday, June 01, 2011

Blooming late...

The cotton from the Cottonwoods is driving me NUTS. It's everywhere. When you open the door to go in and out, it flies in. It ruins the water in the pool and stick in the screens. YUCK!!!

So, yesterday I was trying to find something to entertain me on TV while I folded laundry. I came across My Dinner with Andre. It's an older movie that is based around a conversation at dinner between two acquaintances. I watched it in HS and was intrigued. Movies heavy in dialogue are my favorite. I love good conversation. I really feel that I'd like to try to write a play. I haven't been writing enough to be good right now, but I feel that if I tried my hand at this, I could finish something. A novel is never going to happen. I think I've mentioned this desire before. I need a setting. I have a few ideas...but nothing groundbreaking.

To inspire me, I Googled late start authors and feel much better. Here's what Wikipedia had:

Writing

Many writers have published their first major work late in life. Mary Wesley might be a classic example. She wrote two children's books in her late fifties, but her writing career did not gain note until her first novel at 70, written after the death of her husband.[59] Harriet Doerr published her first novel at age 74, and went on to great praise.[60] A possibly more well known example might be Laura Ingalls Wilder. She became a columnist in her forties, but did not publish her first novel in the Little House series of children's books until her sixties.[61]

Memoirist and novelist Flora Thompson was first published in her thirties but is most famous for the semi-autobiographical Lark Rise to Candleford trilogy, the first volume of which was published when she was 63. Children's author Mary Alice Fontenot wrote her first book at 51 and wrote almost thirty additional books, publishing multiple volumes in her eighties and nineties.[62] Kenneth Grahame was born in 1859, joined the Bank of England in 1879 and rose through the ranks to become its Secretary. Although he had written various short stories while working at the bank, it was only after his retirement in 1908 that he published his masterpiece and final work The Wind in the Willows.[63]

Charles Bukowski published his first novel at age 49 after a lengthy career working odd jobs and then at a post office.[64] Richard Adams's first novel, the bestseller Watership Down, was published when he was in his fifties. Anthony Burgess, the novelist best known for A Clockwork Orange, published his first novel at age 39. William S. Burroughs was also 39 when he published his first novel, Junky. The Marquis de Sade published his first novel, Justine, after turning 51. Henry Miller published his novel Tropic of Cancer at 44. Raymond Chandler published his first short story at 45, and his first novel, The Big Sleep at 51.

In other areas of writing, poet Wallace Stevens started late in life after years as an insurance salesman and executive. Although he was first published at 38, his "canonical works" came out in his fifties.[65] In philosophy Mary Midgley had her first book when she was 56.[66] Edmond Hoyle wrote a booklet on whist in his late sixties. To avoid unauthorized copies he wrote the copyrighted A Short Treatise on the Game of Whist at age 70.[67]

The Indian writer and polymath Nirad C. Chaudhuri wrote his autobiography The Autobiography of an Unknown Indian at the age of 54. He wrote a sequel to it Thy Hand, Great Anarch! at the age of 90. He published his next work (and his final work) Three Horsemen of the New Apocalypse at the age of 100.[68]

Aron Ettore Schmitz published his first novel Senilità in his 38th year, however it was not until he published Zeno's Conscience that he made a breakthrough, aged 61. Even this was self-published.[69]

Joseph Conrad was one of the greatest authors in the English language. He could not speak a word of English until he was about 21. He only started writing in English at about age 32, and his first published works came out when he was about 37.[70]

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