A couple of weeks ago, I took part in a panel discussion during Lesley University’s 2020 Creative Writing MFA winter residency. The topic: “Writing in a Time of Climate Anxiety.” Together, I and the other panelists talked about the need for writers to start writing stories that matter.
My Very First “Writer” Interview!! Over on the website Interviews from the Void, I had the honor of chatting with Arthur McCabe about a whole bunch of interesting writing stuff. It’s a sign of how inept I am at professional marketing and blogging that I only just thought today of mentioning this on my own …
If you’ve ever watched an Olympic sporting event like the floor routine in gymnastics, you might have seen shots of athletes preparing to compete. They stand to the side, eyes closed, twisting their bodies around in odd ways. You know what they’re doing. They’re envisioning their routine, imagining the jumps, the turns, the tucks. The same thing happening to those athlete’s brains as they pre-visualize their routines occurs inside readers’ minds when they read. Provided, that is, an author uses a few key neuroscience tricks when they write.
Regardless of the quality of the actual story being told, the writing can either engage us or bore us. Understanding the neuroscience of reading can help you grab readers by the brain and engage them more effectively.