I participated in the 1000 Words of Summer yearly challenge that novelist Jami Attenberg holds on her CRAFT TALK Substack. While I didn’t participate in the actual community, as it involved being a paid member of her substack, instead of the two week challenge, I completed 30 days of writing at least 1000 words in June 2023. It is another June as I compile this, but I guarantee I write more than 1000 words pretty much every day now. I never got around to purchasing her 1000 Words book, which is something I still need to do. However, I have a LOT of quotes from her that I need to collect. So, here goes.
From Her Memoir, “I Came All This Way to Meet You”
On Reveling in Her Brain: “Who knows what my life would have been like if I’d had any confidence in my appearance as a youth. Instead, I reveled in my brain, and all the places it could take me. I was as fearless as I liked in my imagination. I would not trade my relationship with my brain for anything — it has always served me best; it is truthful, reliable, powerful; it solves problems; it makes art; it helps me to be of service in the universe. It is my reason for being.”
Best thing Jami has ever written.
On Books as Life Rafts: “…These books that are life rafts, these authors who never know exactly what they’re doing for all of us when they’re writing them. I can’t imagine that when they sit down to work on them, they think: Today I will save a life.”
On Being a Novelist: “The thing with being a novelist — or really any creative endeavor — is we have to willingly enter into the not knowing. We have to embrace that fact that there are myriad nuances to be unfolded. Characters we haven’t met yet, actions we haven’t invented. Thousands upon thousands of words waiting to be chosen. If I know how a story ends when I start writing a book, I throw it aside. It’s not worth sitting if there are no surprises… everything is a risk.”
On Being a Smart Girl: “Being a smart girl is always better… being a smart girl means you can always take care of yourself. Being a smart girl means you can figure shit out. Being a smart girl means your self-worth does not alter with time… I invest heavily in being a smart girl…”
On Clothes: “I mistake control of my outward appearance as architecture for my soul.”
On Encouragement by Example: “… we receive so much from other writers when they show us how it’s done… an encouragement by example… This is why it’s always important to be reading. This is why we must always chew on the words of others. It’s nutrition. Eat your dinner.”
On Family Dynamics: “…family dynamics were always a grand and fascinating mystery, and I watched for unspoken nuances with the reverence of a daytime soap opera.” So that’s why so many women, not including myself, love those things, the family dynamics and unspoken nuances… I’m all for the latter, but I avoid the former like the plague
On Grief: “Grief can be forever. We are taught to seek closure in this country, we are encouraged to move on quickly. We are judged, possibly, for not getting over things fast enough. But grief can be for your whole life.” (Yes, it can.)
On Making Great Art: “I believe that one must arrive at an intersection of hunger and fear to make great art.” (This is when Jami is asked by a fellow author why she chose to write the book that became her first bestseller.)
On Taking So Many Temp Jobs: “I was creative and I was curious and there was a propulsiveness to my life— I was completely engaged in forward motion —yet I had no specific direction.”
On the Significance of Statues: “Many statues are individually mediocre, but collectively powerful. They represent thousands of prayers made over time, standing as aging sentinels of the wants, hopes, and needs of long past souls who pass on through to some other place and time now long forgotten.”
This bit on Brain Picking is paraphrased, but important to include here: Brain picking sessions of bestselling authors or popular artists often reveal the happy accidents, and the sad ones also, that lead to the creation of an artwork.
Jami Attenberg on Two Wrong Turns: “I have always felt like I was two wrong turns away from complete destruction. We all are, and we’re fooling ourselves if we think we’re not.” (I Came All This Way to Meet You)
From CRAFT TALK
After she and another novelist read each other’s books: “There was an interesting thing that happened this read for the both of us: in each other’s books we ended up identifying some smaller characters we would lean into more if they were in our own books. Characters that were real and authentic and served their small purpose in our books beautifully in just a page or two, but were the kind of character the other writer would spend many, many more pages on quite lovingly. Give them more to do, exploit their role in the story, give them a big personal history, let them really sing.” – “The Beautiful Sound of Feedback”
“The more time we spend with the work, the more we feel in control of this universe. Close your eyes and picture the physicality of what you’re doing. You’re building a future with your words.” – “Day 7 of 1000 Words of Summer 2023”
(Sadly it seems some of the old 1000 Words of Summer letters are lost and the new ones are paywalled. I get it, she’s gotta make a living. But it’s unfortunate.)
Her advice for pushing through writing 1000 words a day in June: “Each time you show up on the page and push through… it is something positive you are doing for yourself. Because you are challenging yourself. You are driving yourself. Testing your brain to see if it is still alive and present and capable.” – “Day 9 of 1000 Words of Summer” (this one is still live)
A bold reason to write 1000 words daily: “Today you will write 1000 words. Because you believe in the freedom of speech. By participating in this act, by claiming your time and space to create these words for yourself, you are asserting the importance of this freedom. Not everyone has this right. Don’t waste it. Write those 1000 words.” – “Day 10 of 1000 Words of Summer” (this one isn’t live anymore)
Another reason to write 1000 words daily: “Today you will write 1000 words. Because life is a gorgeous and whirling mixture of sounds and images and feelings, and writing these words is one of the best ways for you to access it, participate in it, contribute to that joy, joy, joy. Because you are a writer. That is what you do. That is how you connect to it all.” – “Day 13 of 1000 Words of Summer 2023” (this is, for now)
More to come…?
