Showing posts with label fairy tale writing. Show all posts
Showing posts with label fairy tale writing. Show all posts

Thursday, March 4, 2021

Carterhaugh’s "Spellcraft" Is Like Joining A Wizarding School Especially for Fairy Tale Writers (+ Bonus Interview w/Drs. Cleto & Warman)

"Books are a uniquely portable magic."

(Stephen King)


You've heard this.


You nod your head in fervent agreement every time you do.


And you not-so-secretly wish to hold "portable magic" in your hands that you created.


But - and this is a perfectly logical thought: if books are portable magic, do I need to be a witch or wizard to create one? 


Yes. Yes, you do.

And YOU CAN BECOME ONE.


Writing books, especially ones that draw powerfully on folklore and fairy tales, seems like a special, magical talent, beyond the ability of regular mortals but here's a secret: if you're reading this, if you're curious about writing and love folklore, you can learn to be a Word Wizard. Words are spells. And you can learn how to wield them to create magic. You can become a Word Witch. Anyone who truly wants to - and is willing to get themselves a little magical learnin' - can.


Best of all? There is now a course for wannabe Word Witches and Wizards that anyone anywhere in the world can take. 


You can learn how to be a Word Witch or Wizard and use your love of fairy tales and folklore to springboard you into your new magical role!

Your course?

Spellcraft: Write Like A Witch


The place?

The Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic


You can think of it as an inclusive, accessible "Wizarding School for Fairy Tale and Folklore Writers"; with award-winning Word Witch Professors who have hundreds of hours of Spellcrafting under their belts as your guides, different tracks for Word Witches and Wizards looking to specialize, magical reading lists, a uniquely beautiful Spellbook you can literally add your own spells to (available in digital format to type or touchscreen-scribe on, with instructions should you wish to transform it into something to hold in your hands to use with your favorite quill and ink), an enchanting group of peers - all with great magic potential - who will cheer you on and point out magic they've found in the world along the way, and much more!


Yes, there are even t-shirts if you want them. (For real!)


Magic is rarely easy. It takes work, effort, and persistent concentration. Sometimes it even makes you sweat. Writing is no different. But then there are also times where it feels like you've stepped through a portal, lost time, and emerge with a world and characters on a page that never existed before. It really is Magic. But how can those two things both be true at the same time?


Spellcraft will show you how; how to survive the first and harness the second. Now there's a way to learn how to become a real Word Witch or Wizard, so that your spellcraft becomes - not hit or miss- but a solid skill, with you becoming more capable of accessing real magic more often. 


So what does Spellcraft: Write Like A Witch have that no other writing book or course has?

  • it's designed specifically for folks who love fairy tales and folklore and want to write
  • the course comes with TWO built-in fairy godmothers to guide you personally (if you wish)
  • you get invited to be part of the inclusive Carterhaugh community, many with similar Word Witching goals to you
  • you have front-row access to scholarly insight into how folklore and fairy tales can richly inform your writing (any writing)
  • it includes a magical library's worth of writing resources specially curated for folklore and fairy tale folk, like you
  • it goes beyond the book - Spellcraft is intrinsically attached to the extended resources and community of The Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic, so, if you do the course and complete the workbook, it really is like joining a Wizarding School!

We assume, if you've been following Once Upon A Blog even a short amount of time that you familiar with who and what Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic, is, so we'll just add that Dr. Sara Cleto and Dr. Brittany Warman are very active writers themselves, continually publishing creative works, as well as scholarly ones, in various journals, magazines, and books, even while they’re teaching; these women can teach AND can do! (If Carterhaugh School is new to you, or you need an overview-refresh, please click HERE.) 


Perhaps, though, you're wondering if this new writing book-and-course is really for you. Perhaps you're thinking "but what if this is too niche/not niche enough?" or "how could my love of fairy tale and folklore possibly help me with 'real' writing that will get me published?"

Dr. Brittany Warman (standing) & Dr. Sara Cleto
The Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic


We thought we'd take some of the questions to our Magical Professors friends of Carterhaugh, Dr. Brittany Warman and Dr. Sara Cleto, and ask them directly.

~*~*~*~*~

Hi Brittany and Sara!


Thanks so much for taking the time to answer some questions about Spellcraft. It's a HUGE resource - over 100 pages, with bonus options on top too - so we want to be sure our OUABlog readers get a good idea of just how unique Spellcraft is, and how it's been created specifically for writers just like them.


First of all, how would you "elevator pitch" Spellcraft to a folklore and fairy tale fan who's looking for a way to access the wizardry of story writing?


Accessing the magic of writing can be like trying to capture a will-o’-wisp (complete with getting lost in various swamps of despair)! If you’ve read a library’s worth of advice and none of it can connect your love of fairy tales and folklore to writing the stories of your heart, we get it. Enter Spellcraft: Write Like A Witch. We created a tailor-made grimoire for writers who prefer a little wonder in their world, and it's filled with keys to help unlock quality "spellcraft" that’s unique to you. Words are spells  - as certified folklore and literature experts we can prove it! - and writers are witches. If you’re wishing you could find that elusive portal to the magic of writing and you’re passionate about creating fairy-tale and folklore-infused work, Spellcraft is for you!


How is Spellcraft different from other "how-to-write" books and courses?


We made Spellcraft: Write Like a Witch because writing is hard enough without pretending it’s just for melancholy bros. Because there are tools, prompts, and inspiration galore for writers who steep themselves in magic, folklore, and fairy tales and we’ve pulled them together just for those writers. If you want to write with confidence and to feel like writing is fun again, this is for you!


Why will writers who love fairy tales and folklore find the writing tips and exercises in Spellcraft more relatable than regular books?


The prompts and tips in Spellcraft were all written with lovers of fairy tales and folklore in mind. It’s literally custom-made for you. There are sections titled “20 Ways to Start a Fairy-Tale Retelling” and “Folklore & Worldbuilding.” You’re just not going to see that kind of focus in other writing books.


I love folklore and fairy tales but what if I don't really want to write a fantasy novel, a fairy tale retelling, or kid lit (which is what people usually think about when they hear you've written something using folklore or fairy tales)? What other genres can Spellcraft be used for?


The great thing about fairy tales and folklore is that they are “all genre friendly”! You can find fairy tales in fantasy, mystery, sci-fi, literature, ad copy, scripts, romance, horror, YA.. all of them! The tools in Spellcraft can be customized for any genre that appeals to you.


That said, while there is a ton of material in Spellcraft about fairy-tale retellings in particular, there are also tips and exercises about other genres. We talk about “The Art of the Ghost Story,” for instance, and how fairy tales can help shape memoir. There’s also a lot of writing advice and tools that aren’t genre-specific - as long as you’re interested in fairy tales and folklore, these are materials that will resonate with you!



Can Spellcraft help me with my non-fiction?


Absolutely! Folklore is a huge part of everyday life, so it can also be a powerful force in non-fiction. And there’s tons of writing advice and inspiration that can be applied to non-fiction, from discussions of folklore itself to tips for writing dialog to guidelines on starting a writing group and giving (and getting!) useful feedback.


I want to write a memoir but my life isn't exactly magical, even though I love reading fairy tales. How can using the Spellcraft workbook and doing the course help me write something like that?


There’s a prompt and corresponding exercise in Spellcraft that will help you do exactly this! It will help you see your life, and all its non-magical events, through the lens of a fairy tale. We’ve used it with dozens of students, and we’ve seen its power first-hand!


Then again, what if I really DO want to write a retelling of a fairy tale or folktale - a GOOD one - how will Spellcraft help me write something fresh and, well, "good"? Can Spellcraft help me avoid the dreaded cliched fairy tale retelling pitfalls?


Yes! We talk a lot in Spellcraft about what makes something a good fairy-tale retelling, and we take a look at what can make a retelling fall flat, too! Between the many (many) fairy-tale prompts, the close-ups on some of our favorite fairy-tale retellings, and a deep dive into a retelling that just doesn’t quite work, you’ll be armed with a ridiculous amount of knowledge and strategies for crafting your own successful retelling.



Can
Spellcraft help me get my fairy tale/folklore-based work published?


If you’re interested in publishing your work, we put together a special package called Bewitch: Getting to Publication, which you can grab along with Spellcraft! If you don’t know where to begin or you're feeling discouraged after another rejection or maybe you'd just like to figure out how to make publishing easier and less stressful, Bewitch is definitely for you! Bewitch gives you access to our submission tracker to keep your pieces organized, a publication-ready checklist to make sure you're setting your submissions up to succeed, insider knowledge on some of our favorite fairy-tale-friendly markets, and a template for submitting your work.



I want to write but I seriously-no-joke have
zero time. I can't even watch Netflix like regular people! Is there some magical way to write anyway? Does Spellcraft have something that can help me too? What about if what I truly want to write is a novel? Can Spellcraft help me do that or am I forever doomed to write flash fiction and short poems until I a) win the lottery or b) can free up hours of my schedule?


Oh yes. If you’re in this place (we call it the “I’m going to die if I have to write today but I will also die if I don’t write today” place), we’ve whipped up another toolkit for you called Magic Momentum: Master Your Writing in 15 Minutes a Day. It’s basically all the tools, rituals, and mindset practices that we used to write and finish our dissertations for our PhDs (basically - 300+ page books that we revised a million times.) It was BRUTAL, and we wish we’d had Magic Momentum at the time - but it’s our hard-won knowledge of how to write and keep writing when the situation is dire!

Finally, if Spellcraft was a magical helper in a fairy tale, who would it be (and why)?


Pretty sure Spellcraft would have to be Cinderella’s fairy godmother. There’s even a fairy godmother pep talk in Magic Momentum to help you get to the ball/ finish your manuscript!


Thank you for answering our questions about your new (incredibly expanded) Spellcraft course and workbook! 



Spellcraft:

Write Like A Witch

is AVAILABLE NOW


- and you can begin making your own portable magic immediately.


JUST CLICK HERE FOR A WONDERFUL OVERVIEW & TO BUY



Words are spells.

Writers are witches.



Writing

is

magic!

Image credits from top: photographer/artist unknown, The Secrets by Mikeila Borgia, Personal by Valeria Heine Photography, Neverending story by Patryk Morzonek, Fiction by Dasha Pears, Official Carterhaugh Portrait of Dr.s Warman & Cleto, Floating Books/Red Library (cropped) by Zuzana Uhlíková, Every real story is a neverending story by Joan Carol Photography, With books by Elena Tatulyan, Carterhaugh's promotional pic for Spellcraft, Spellcraft Workbook Cover by Carterhaugh. official logo of The Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic

Friday, October 30, 2020

Carterhaugh's All-Halloween-Day Online Event "Haunted" will be full of Folkloric Revelry, Ghostly Storytelling, Visiting Witches, Creating Fairy Tales and Spells and More! (last day to register!)

Art by Aaron Jasinkski

 It's Halloween Eve! So... All Hallow's Eve-Eve... yeah. 

The 31st is less than 24 hours away and if you're ready to get all dressed up but have no Halloween ball to go to and feel like you're going to turn into a pumpkin yourself at this point in the crazy, we have just the thing:

Carterhaugh's School of Folklore and the Fantastic's

Haunted: An Online Halloween Extravaganza!

In this all-day online Halloween event, you can get your witchy party on, let your purple locks down in full folklore mode, tell stories till you shiver, weave spells and magic with words and fairy tales, or pour bewitching drinks and sing ballads till you cackle and cry and much more, all in your Halloween best!

It's an extravaganza indeed: this is an all-day-long series of folklore-filled Halloween events with an amazing lineup of folklorists, artists, and authors at the top of their game. Look at these folks!

Dr. Theodora Goss, author of Snow White Learns Witchcraft and The Extraordinary Adventures of the Athena Club series
Lindsey Marton O’Brien, founder of Lumina Noctis
Shveta Thakrar, author of Star Daughter
Dr. Kay Turner, former president of the American Folklore Society
Dr. Stephen Winick, folklorist of the Library of Congress and folksinger
Dr. Margaret Yocom, professor emerita at George Mason University
-and, of course-
Dr. Sara Cleto & Dr. Brittany Warman, the folklorists and fairy tale professors who founded The Carterhaugh School of Folklore and the Fantastic

If you're wishing your Halloween had a bit more magic, or stories, or costumes, or mixed drinks and spooky ballads - this is the event for you. You can start in the morning and stay all day, or you can come to just a few (they will all be recorded)  - there are so very many different things to choose from!

Carterhaugh's Founders, Dr. Brittany Warman
& Dr. Sara Cleto a.k.a. Fairy Tale Profs

We are most excited about: 

  • the How to Write a (Halloween) Fairy Tale Writing Workshop
  • the mixing of drinks (recipes available NOW to prep!) and ballads in The Night It is Gud Hallowe'en
  • learning the way of Fairy Godmothers and Crones in the "Exploring the Witch's Way: Transgression and Transformation" workshop
  • discovering the secret transformation techniques of wood wives and other face and body painting magic with a shapechanger
  • hearing ghost stories told by authors who know how to bring the chill (and whom we're almost certain are real witches writing spells into their books!)
  • learning how to spin spells across a crowd and thoroughly enchant listeners with the "Tales from the Spirit World: Telling Our Stories" storytelling workshop
  • listening to Victorian Ghost Stories being told as the sun goes down and the veils thins..

Oh heck, we're excited about everything! 

Halloween Cat by tinca2

And there are bonus recipes! Bonus PDFs! A bonus playlist! And a Bonus Costume Contest! (That's right - wear that costume all day or change or for each event - Halloween revelry and celebration of all things magical and folkloric is highly encouraged and you know you want to anyway...!)

Go HERE for more details and to sign up. Today is the LAST DAY to get yourself a seat in this magical circle for Halloween 2020!

We would tell you more but we have to go create our costume for tomorrow! Go HERE for all the secrets, er, details and discover that the spirit of Halloween is alive and well and being celebrated like never before. There has never been anything like this folkloric-fantastic-fairytale-fabulous Halloween all-day event, and you do not want to miss out!

PS Cats and other familiars are welcome.

PPS Also: if you're in the US, and haven't already, GO VOTE! (We'll be ready to party with you when you get back)

Trick: Animated #govote jack-o-lantern to keep away the ghosts of low voter turnout.

Treat: Tell your friends to visit rockthevote.com to find their polling station!

(animated gif by Bruce Willen)



Wednesday, November 2, 2016

Breaking News: EW Puts 'Beauty and the Beast' on the Cover & Shares 9 New Stills

All aboard the roller coaster ride to the release of Disney's live action Beauty and the Beast!

About an hour ago, Entertainment Weekly shared the cover for their upcoming cover, which has exclusive photos and cast interviews on the movie. Already going viral, the EW website has shared nine stills from the movie, giving fans the best taste to-date of what the film will be like.

From EW:
 For this week’s cover story, EW visited the film’s U.K. set and spoke with [the cast], as well as director Bill Condon and costume designer Jacqueline Durran, who talked about creating the new version of the iconic yellow dress Belle wears in the original film’s ballroom scene. In addition, we chatted with Ewan McGregor, who voices the enchanted, “Be Our Guest”-performing candelabra Lumière, and Sir Ian McKellen, who plays the clock Cogsworth and was apparently desperate to get his own big production number. “I kept singing what I thought would be a rather good addition to the score,” says the X-Men franchise star. “‘My name is Cogsworth!/ And I’m a clock!/Ticktock!’ But I didn’t get my own song.” 
Readers can also find out about the film’s new songs — penned by Alan Menken and Tim Rice — and feast their eyes on an array of exclusive photos featuring all of the aforementioned characters as well as Belle’s father, Maurice (Kevin Kline), Mrs Potts. (Emma Thompson), and Plumette (Gugu Mbatha-Raw).
Clark Collis, Senior Editor for Entertainment Weekly, gave a brief and entertaining interview, talking about writing the cover story for the upcoming issue, which you can see (along with sneak peeks) below:
G-nome. Heh.

Okay then.

Are you ready for the images? 

Here they are:








We have no doubt there are fans out there in happy tears right now, while others are still scratching their heads over those enchanted objects. Overall, it doesn't appear to be a great departure from the animated classic at all. Our one query is that it seems a bit dark with lots of browns and dark, moody lighting, but then, these are production stills, and they can often look quite different in tone from the movie. Either way, everyone in the office here has announced they'd happily cough up for silver screen tickets.

Bustle grabbed this preview from the video shared above, a cropped shot of one of the spreads from the upcoming EW issue, specifically discussing costuming and design. If you look closely you can see comments about that famous yellow dress.
The one we like best is:
“For Emma, it was important that the dress was light and that it had a lot of movement… In Emma’s reinterpretation, Belle is an active princess. She did not want a dress that was corseted or that would impede her in any way.”
To see more you'll need to pick up a copy of Entertainment Weekly, which will be on stands this Friday, and/or subscribe for the exclusive access features.
The current Twitter header for Entertainment Weekly. You can see a larger version, showing all the nuances in expressions, HERE.
Update at 1:16pm, same day: We have just learned that Emma Watson has been participating in the Books in the Underground movement, leaving copies of books they love, all around the London Tube. The BBC reported:
“The star left the novels as part of the Books On The Underground movement which sees ‘book fairies’ leave their favourite reads for people to enjoy. Watson left about 100 books with some including a hand-written note….Books on the Underground started in 2012 and leave about 150 books in stations across London each week.”
Emma Watson is a book fairy! Can we like this woman any more?

Fairy Tale Bonus of the Day:
Ever wonder who was Linda Woolverton's inspiration for writing Belle as she did? (Woolverton was screenwriter of Disney's animated Beauty and the Beast.)

EW and Bustle shared some behind the scenes on this earlier in May this year, which we're now sharing some of below:
Entertainment Weekly... interviewed the legendary screenwriter behind the movie, Linda Woolverton, to ask her about Belle's development as a character — and, in turn, to uncover one big thing about Beauty and the Beast that even hardcore fans don't know... Probably the most unexpected part of the interview centers on how Hollywood back then was dominated by "the whole idea of the heroine-victim" — something hard to imagine post tough-Disney heroines like Princess Jasmine, Mulan, and Merida. Woolverton discovered her own background in the feminist movement in the '60s and '70s meant she "definitely couldn’t buy that this smart, attractive young girl, Belle, would be sitting around and waiting for her prince to come."
"That she was someone who suffers in silence and only wants a pure rose? That she takes all this abuse but is still good at heart? I had a hard time with that," she told EW.

And then she revealed her inspiration: Katherine Hepburn in 1933's Little Women (playing Jo).


When EW asked Woolverton about her having said she modeled the character after Katharine Hepburn in Little Women, the screenwriter responded:
Yes. That was a real depiction of womanhood. I think you can take on current issues of today through fairy tales or the mythic. And so that was my fight, always saying, 'The audience is just not gonna buy this anymore.'

It's not difficult to see some parallels between Belle and Hepburn/Jo, like the wandering, book reading and love of outdoors, is it? We think she made a good choice.

Saturday, September 17, 2016

Article: Seanan McGuire on Fairy Tales and Poetry: Pamela Dean's Tam Lin

On tor.com this week, writer of fairy tales and and folklore based novels (among other fun books), got wonderfully nostalgic about Pamela Dean's treatment of another favorite fairy tale of ours, Tam Lin. There's quite a group of people who were greatly impacted by this book, both for the fairy tale themes and the style of writing, not to mention the poetry.

Here's an excerpt:
I liked fairy tales. I liked folk music. When I found a book in a line of books about fairy tales, with a title taken from a ballad, I figured it would be good for a few hours. 
I didn’t expect it to change my life. 
Tam Lin, by Pamela Dean, is one of those books that defies description in the best way, because it both is and is not a fantasy. For most of the book, it’s the story of a girl named Janet starting her college life, with all the changes and chaos that entails. She sees weird things on campus. Okay. Everyone sees weird things on campus. I was already taking classes at the community college across the street from my high school, and I’d seen a man with six squirrels on a leash, a woman attending all her classes in a ball gown, and a person we all called “Troll” whose wardrobe consisted mostly of chain mail and rabbit skins. College campuses are alive with weird things. 
Only her weird things are very real, and eventually they make it clear that the book is a fantasy, and more, that Janet is in some pretty deep sh*t. 
...Tam Lin is a book about choices and consequences, friendships and relationships, and the way our adult selves are built on the bones of the children we once were. It’s also about poetry. If Pamela Dean had never written another word, she would still deserve to be remembered as one of the greats, for this book alone. 
Read it.
You can read the whole article HERE.