One of my workshop students asked me how to overcome significant writers' block. Here's what I told him:
"Write one, strong, honest sentence and then close your notebook. That way you'll have written something well and can let that be the last good shot on the basketball court until you have time to shoot some more hoops, if you'll forgive the metaphor. Your memory of it will be a good one, and when the time is right, you'll want to write more."
Scott Lax
Author & Educator
Archives
(Novels, Nonfiction Books, Short Stories, Long-form essays and some poems are included) 1. "The Deposition" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 2. "Down to Bone" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 3. "Nightengale" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 4. "The Benefit of the Doubt" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 5. "Deep Kiss" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 6. "The Liar" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 7. "Top of The Pops," about Andy Warhol, essay by Louis Menand, The New Yorker 8. "Soldiers Joy" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 9. "The Rich Brother" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 10. "Leviathan" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 11. "Desert Breakdown, 1968" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 12. "Say Yes" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 13. "Mortals" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 14. "Flyboys" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 15. "Sanity" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 16. "The Other Miller" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 17. "Two Boys and a Girl" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 18. "The Chain" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 19. HAVANAS IN CAMELOT (Essays) William Styron 15. "Smorgasbord" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 16. "Lady's Dream" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 17. "Powder" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 18. "The Night in Question" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 19. "Firelight" (Short Story) Tobias Wolff 20. "Bullet in the Brain" (Tobias Wolff) 21. "A Perfect Day for Banana Fish" (Short Story) J.D. Salinger 22. INDIGNATION (Novel) Philip Roth 23. "It's Six A.M. Do You Know Where You Are?" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 24. "Smoke" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 25. "Invisible Fences" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 26. "The Madonna of Turkey Season (Short Story) Jay McInerney 27. "Third Party" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 28. "In the North-West Frontier Province" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 29. "Appetite" (Short Story) Said Sayrafiezadeh 30. "My Public Service" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 31. "The Waiter" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 32. "The Queen and I" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 33. "The Debutante's Return" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 34. "Simple Gifts" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 35. "How it Ended" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 36. "Head Case: Can psychiatry be saved?" (Essay) Louis Menand 37. "Story of My Life" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 38. "Philomentha" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 39. "Con Doctor" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 40. "Getting In Touch With Lonnie" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 41. "Summary Judgment" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 42. "I.D." (Short Story) Joyce Carol Oates 43. "I Love You, Honey" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 44. "Sleeping With Pigs" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 45. "Everything is Lost" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 46. "Reunion" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 47. "Putting Daisy Down" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 48. "The Business" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 49. "Penelope on the Pond" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 50. "The Last Bachelor" (Short Story) Jay McInerney 51. "Gavin Highly" (Short Story) Janet Frame 52. "The TV" (Short Story) Ben Loory 53. YOU: ON A DIET: The Owner's Manual for Waist Management (nonfiction book) Mehmet C. Oz, M.D., Michael F. Roizen, M.D 54. "The Lower River" (Short Story) Paul Theroux 55. "Master of Revels: Neil Simon’s comic empire" (Essay) .by John Lahr 56. "The Hunted: Did American conservationists in Africa go too far?" (Essay) by Jeffrey Goldberg 57. "Trailhead" (Short Story) E.O. Wilson 58, "Ash" (Short Story) Roddy Doyle 59. "What Did Jesus Do? Reading and unreading theGospels" (Essay) by Adam Gopnik 60. "Exhaust" (Poem) C.K. Williams 61. "Roanoke Pastorale" (Poem) David Huddle 62. "Agreeable" (Short Story) Jonathan Franzen 63. "Extreme Solitude" (Short Story) Jeffrey Eugenides 64. "Letter From Chicago: The Daley Show-the most powerful mayor in America" (essay) Evan Osnos 65. SCOUNDREL TIME (Novel) Lillian Hellman 66. THE RED THREAD (Novel) Ann Hood Reading list 2009
1. THE SPY WHO CAME IN FROM THE COLD (novel) - John Le Carre 2. SNARK (nonfiction book) - David Denby 3. A YEAR IN PROVENCE (nonfiction book) - Peter Mayle 4. A SIMPLE PLAN (novel) - Scott Smith 5. TENDER IS THE NIGHT (novel) - F. Scott Fitzgerald 6. OUTLIERS: THE STORY OF SUCCESS (nonfiction book) - Malcolm Gladwell 7. ENCORE PROVENCE (nonfiction book) - Peter Mayle 8. THE DEVIL TREE (novel) - Jerzy Kosinski 9. BIG BAD LOVE (fiction, book of short stories)- Larry Brown (re-read) 10. BRIGHT LIGHTS, BIG CITY (novel) - Jay McInerney' (re-read) 11. A HEDONIST IN THE CELLAR: Adventures in Wine (nonfiction book) - Jay McInerney 12. NETHERLAND (novel) - Joseph O'Neill 13. "A Sliver Dish" (short story) - Saul Bellow 14. "Gesturing" (short story) - John Updike 15. "Janus" (short story) Ann Beattie 16. "The Things they Carried" (short story) - Tim O'Brien (re-read) 17. "Crazy Sunday" (short story) - F. Scott Fitzgerald (re-read) 18. "Once More to the Lake" (essay) - E.B. White (re-read) 19. "Indianapolis (Highway 74) - (short story) Sam Shepard 20. "In the Garden of the North American Writers" (short story) Tobias Wolff 21. "Next Door" (short story) Tobias Wolff 22. "Hunters in the Snow" (short story) Tobias Wolff 23. "That Room" (short story) Tobias Wolff 24. "A White Bible" (short story) Tobias Wolff 25. "Her Dog" (short story) Tobias Wolff 26. "A Mature Student" (short story) Tobias Wolff TEACHING 2010 - The Hub City Writers' Workshop of South Carolina awards the second annual Scott Lax Prize in Writing to Bertrice Robinson. The Scott Lax Prize is a full-ride, one-week scholarship to the Wild Acres Writers Workshop in North Carolina. This award was established in 2008 by Hillcrest Publications of Spartanburg, S.C., "in recognition of novelist Scott Lax of Ohio." 2009 - The Hub City Writers' Workshop of South Carolina awards the first annual Scott Lax Prize in Writing to Josette Davison. FICTION February 14, 2010 - Scott Lax's short story, "Sales Call," won 2nd Place for Fiction Lit's (Cleveland's Literary Center) Muse Magazine 2010 Literary Competition. 1999 - The Year That Trembled, a Novel named Vermont Book of the Year, Runner-Up. Dec. 1998 - The Year That Trembled, a Novel, named of of 1998’s “Milestones in Fiction by Denver Post. 1998 - Sewanee Writers’ Conference (Univ. of the South), Walter E. Dakin Fellowship in Fiction NON-FICTION May 22, 2010 - In the Ohio Professional Writers 2010 Communications Contest, Scott Lax won Second Place for "Original Columns, General." May 16, 2009 - In the Ohio Professional Writers 2009 Communication Contest, Scott Lax was awarded: 1. First Place for "Original Columns, General" 2. First Place for "Feature Story, Magazine" 3. Second Place for "Special Series, Print Media." June 2008: Ohio Excellence in Journalism Award, statewide competition, sponsored by The Cleveland Press Club, Honorable Mention, Best Single Essay, Open Print 1993 - Bread Loaf Writer’ Conference (Middlebury College), Bernard J. O’Keefe Scholarship in Nonfiction 1994, 1995 - Bread Loaf Writer’s Conference, Staff Scholarship FILM 2002 - Midwest Filmmaker of the Year, Cleveland International Film Festival 2002 - Producer’s Award, Winner, People’s Choice, Cincinnati International Film Festival 2002 - Producer’s Award, Winner, Best Regional Feature, Cincinnati International Film Festival 2002 - Bessie’s People’s Choice Award, Burlington, VT City Arts, Favorite Film OTHERS 2002 - City of Cleveland Certificate of Congratulations for body of work 1999 - Named to fourteen-person list of Hiram College’s “Most Illustrious Alumni" Recommended Web Sites & Blogs
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