Writing Update

One thing I try not to do in my posts is apologize for not posting because I have been busy.

I am all but done with Narrative Journalism, having finished my long-form piece on beer and brewing in Ithaca. Right now I am looking to get it published somewhere, so I should probably stop posting extracts online. But I can't help myself. Here's the lede paragraph:

Tell me, O muse, of the drink of many flavors,
That’s traveled far and wide and drunken drinkers of old.
Many are the men whose hearts it heartened and speeches it slurred.
Pale ale to pitch-black porter, lightest lager to richest imperial stout,
I seek beer, served in pub and bar and brewed in home and brewery.
Through my own folly I fail, fool, drinking without discerning,
As though Dionysus himself kept me from learning.
Of these things, fermenter of imagination, tell me,
In my search for perfect beer in snowy Ithaca.

That's what it's all about, in a barley husk.

Previous chapters:
Trappist Westvleteren
Beer, in a Barley Husk
Driving to the Ithaca Beer Company (Excised from the final draft)
Trivia at the Nameless Bar (Significantly cut down in the final draft)

I was talking with a friend yesterday about how well all the pieces are turning out. It is amazing how much improvement comes with four years of writing. And as much as I love to lambast The Ithacan - for its rowing coverage [except for the women's team, which has a great reporter covering them this year], accent section, and pretty much anything else that catches my eye - I encourage everyone to pick up an issue next week, which will have a special insert of select narrative pieces produced in Narrative Journalism Workshop. Perhaps even mine.

At this point this post has been mostly about me. Allow me to direct you, then, to "Homebrewed Beer," the blog of a man I watched brew as part of my Narrative piece. He posts a recipe and detailed analysis for every beer he brews. It's pretty awesome.

Besides an eight-page research paper for my Biblical Interpretation class, the last bit of writing for the semester is my English honors thesis on the memetic use of "apocalypse" in the environmentalism movement. I am taking a look at the way environmentalists write about this "environmental apocalypse" and what it says about their outlook. Right now I am working on a section tentatively titled "Polar bears and other native populations."

Essentially the second semester of my senior year has been dedicated to combining my passions: beer and journalism (and poetry), reading and communications and writing and religion. After writing about what everyone else wanted me to write about for years, I feel very fortunate to be able to write about what I want. Hat tips to professors Twomey and Schack. Actually, what I just wrote is not entirely fair. Big hat tip to professor Cohen for inspiring me to blog and thereby continue writing about what I want to write about. Thank you all.

And if you've made it this far, thank you for reading