My Trade Is Mystery
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My Trade Is Mystery Seven Meditations from a Life in Writing

Carl Phillips2022
An invaluable companion for any writer seeking to make the writing life a more complex and cooperative venture In these intimate and eloquent meditations, the award-winning poet Carl Phillips shares lessons he has learned about the writing life, an "apprenticeship to what can never fully be mastered." Drawing on forty years of teaching and mentoring emerging writers, he weaves his experiences as a poet with the necessary survival skills, including ambition, stamina, silence, politics, practice, audience, and community. In the tradition of Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird, Rainer Maria Rilke's Letters to a Young Poet, and Marcus Aurelius's Meditations, this is an invaluable companion for writers at every stage of their journey. Phillips's book serves as a partner in speculation and an invitation to embrace mystery.
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Reviews

Photo of Emma Younger
Emma Younger@emmarain
5 stars
Apr 25, 2024
Profound
Meaningful
Surprising
Photo of Sarah Schumacher
Sarah Schumacher@smschumacher
5 stars
Jun 25, 2023