A Voice of One's Own: Conversations With America's Writing Women

Written a decade ago "A Voice Of One's Own", is a collection of twenty-eight women writer's relections about their craft of writing. The interviewer address to them the questions of what motivates, sustains and inspires them as writers. Unlike other interview collections this work is very inclusive in that it contains women from various racial, ethnic, regional, age and sexual preference groups. Instead of a question and answer format as is usual in most interview collections, the interviewer decides to use a narrative form where one can see the interweaving of the answers and relections of the various authors. They become the center of focus, not the interviewer or the question. Three areas are prominently dealt with in this work. 1. The development of each woman as a writer. Harriet Doerr shares with us that she didn't consider herself a writer until she went to college at age 65. 2. How memory is linked to writing. Gloria Naylor's asserts that all writing filters itself through memory. 3. How children and family impact on writing. Most of the authors have children and share their thoughts about the challenges for that endeavor. Having a voice and knowing how to creatively articulate it is a hallmark of this work. You will be inspired and reflective of your own writing as you hear these voices.