Happy 4th of July from the Downjotter. Stay safe, enjoy the day, and remember these words from Founding Father Benjamin Franklin. “If you would not be forgotten as soon as you are dead, either write things worth reading or do things worth writing.”–Benjamin Franklin
“A certain critic–for such men, I regret to say, do exist–made the nasty remark about my last novel that it contained ‘all the old Wodehouse characters under different names,’ He probably by now has been eaten by bears, like the children who made mock of the prophet Elijah: but if he still survives he will not be able to make a similar charge against Summer Lightning. With my superior intelligence, I have out-generalled the man this time by putting in…
Memorial Day– A Reminder Of Gratitude The Downjotter would like to take this opportunity to thank the many men and women who served this country and are no longer with us. To those who fell on the battlefield and those who lived to tell the tale but have since passed on, thank you. We also want to thank the families who suffered this most noble loss. May your strength be an example to us all.
Monster Needs A Face Shadows dance on the ancient stone walls of the castle with each flash of lightning. Torrents of rain soak the scientist’s ancestral home, seeking to wash it away before the evil within its womb tastes life. Struggling against the storm, yet drawing upon its power, equipment created from the mind of a madman hums. Blue electricity climbs and descends Jacob’s Ladder, building power then regulating its release into insulated copper wire. Charged chemicals flow hesitantly into…
“Write a short story every week. It’snot possible to write 52 bad short stories in a row.”–Ray Bradbury
First, there must be talent, much talent. Talent such as Kipling had. Then there must be discipline. The discipline of Flaubert. Then there must be the conception of what it can be and absolute conscience as unchanging as the standard meter in Paris, to prevent faking. Then the writer must be intelligent and disinterested and above all he must survive. Try to get all these in one person and have him come through all the influences that press on a…