Entry 1: How to Come Up with Topics I would lay money on this statement: Many people who come to Toastmasters really want to improve...

Not feeling well last night (two reasons: exhausting first week of class and my air conditioning was out, making for a very hot house in...

I am not a biologist or epidemiologist. I am a social scientist and understand research and basic biology. I also understand persuasion...

This is not an argument against undergraduate education or the bachelor’s degree. It is an argument against the unreasonable expectation...

First, I’m a huge fan. I’ve watched all sixteen and I plan to go back though them and watch again. They are worth multiple viewings. What...

I just finished Syd Field’s The Foundations of Screenwriting because I’m sitting in on a screenwriting class this summer. I posted on it...

This summer I am sitting in on an introduction to screenwriting course in my academic department. The final output is 30 pages—the first...

I chose to watch all three episodes, equaling about six hours, of Ken Burns latest documentary, Hemingway. First impression: I watched...

The heart of the wise is in the house of mourning, But the heart of fools is in the house of mirth. Ecclesiastes 7:4 House of Mirth is a...

True confessions: I binge watched this show, that is, its first "season." (Seasons doesn't mean what it used to.) It was three hours of...

https://www.charlesanthonysilvestri.com/the-sacred-veil The music of this musical composition is something I am still exploring, but the...

Sometimes we pick up a book (or download it to our devices) for uncertain reasons. Sometimes for me, because a movie version is coming...

"Now, in the passages I have quoted from JANE EYRE, it is clear that anger was tampering with the integrity of Charlotte Brontë the...

The Algonquin Roundtable, the zenith of writers' groups. I have written on this blog, and elsewhere, about the value of writers’ groups...

Everyone (almost) in Western culture is familiar with the parable of the prodigal son in Luke 15. Even if they have no interest...

Back in April I wrote this to a writer I am mentoring. It's an artifact from the intense days of the pandemic shutdown. What a wonderful...

Sometimes in blogging you just want to send your readers to other good sources. Below I have linked an article about whether empathy can...

All of us are skilled in something. All of us are talented in something. There is a difference. Skilled is achieved through thousands of...

What does a best-seller from the mid-1800s have to say to us today? Pretty much everything. 1. Detail. Fiction writers closely observe...

When one reads Austen—and I should say Dickens, Thackeray, the Brontes—one gets a straightforward narrative. The first chapter of David...