The Scene Book: A Primer for the Fiction Writer by Sandra Scofield
It comes as no surprise that Sandra Scofield, who teaches in the low-residency MFA program at Seattle Pacific University, is a firm believer in good, solid practice when it comes to writing. And practice is the name of the game in her new book on craft, where Scofield examines the elements of scenes in fiction. Writing good scenes is vital, she says, because scenes are the places in stories where readers connect to the narrative, where emotion is most active, where things happen. In The Scene Book, Scofield dissects scenes from countless classic and contemporary works, asking how they function, what gives them their emotional pull, and what writers can do on a practical level to improve their scenes. While she acknowledges that much about writing is intuitive and difficult to teach, Scofield contends that there are elements to scenes that can be identified and analyzed, and therefore learned and practiced. This parting of curtains is perhaps the best gift that The Scene Book offers: it demystifies part of the process of writing fiction, urging writers to stop waiting for inspiration and get to work. Scofield wastes no time trying to boost the writer’s confidence or offer inspiration—and good thing. The closest she comes to ego-stroking is a sentence in the first chapter that describes talent as “a love of storytelling and a gift for recognizing, remembering, inventing, and telling stories—a gift you surely have if you are driven to write.” With that out of the way, it’s the cultivation of this talent that Scofield is about. From page one of The Scene Book, class is in session. The book is crammed with dozens of exercises—making it one of the best writing investments available for purchase in paperback form. This is the kind of book to read with a pen in hand—not because you’ll be underlining feel-good quotes, but because you’ll be stopping every other page to do exercises, practice techniques, and scribble down ideas for a new scene.

Purchase The Scene Book online or at your local bookseller.

The Culturally Savvy Christian by Dick Staub
There’s a good chance that the writer and social commentator Dick Staub is a secret apologist for Image. His newest book, The Culturally Savvy Christian, closely parallels Image’s underlying mission: it vigorously challenges readers to discern rather than idly consume, and more importantly, to nourish the contemporary culture rather than becoming pop culture clones. As the past host of a syndicated radio program, Staub has mastered the art of pairing people with ideas and watching them take off. This talent makes The Culturally Savvy Christian a particularly intriguing read: Staub collects facts and voices from sociology, theology, and pop culture and fits them into an insightful conversation about the devolution of culture and evangelicalism. He contends that most Christians, even those who travel in exclusively Christian circles, have been wooed by the forces of marketing and technology and have thereby fallen into an unconscious illicit union with superficiality and sentimentality. Staub dubs this blind self-centeredness Christianity-Lite, and he believes that to avoid a quiet backslide into mediocrity, we must get serious with our faith, sink deeper into the Word, and react to the world with intelligence and creativity. Some Christians bemoan culture’s vulgarities and believe that deepening faith requires us to withdraw into cocoons of Christian isolation and churn out happy-feely Christian art, but Staub warns us that this is not the way of Christ. Instead, he explains that like CS Lewis, JRR Tolkien, and Dostoevsky, “Christian artists are not bound to create religious art, but they understand that their exploration of everyday human occurrences is gilded by their walk in faith.” The Culturally Savvy Christian encourages us to peer through the pop culture fog, dismiss the fluff, and reach for the life-changing, the thoughtful, and the meaningful.

For more information, or to buy the book, click here.

Make Epiphanies Happen: Support an Artist
It can be a constant struggle for believing writers and artists to find the support they need to pursue their craft, either in the church or the secular art community. A huge part of Image’s mission is to give those artists of faith a place to come and be rejuvenated and encouraged to go forth and create. Each year, young people and emerging artists are nurtured at Image events and programs—by the lively conversations, blossoming friendships, and encounters with seasoned artists willing to share their wisdom. Image offers artists something truly unique: the courage to commit to their calling and redeem the culture. But we can’t do it alone. With the Glen a few weeks away, we’re more aware than ever how many students and starving artists are hungry to participate in an Image program like the Glen Workshop, the Milton Center Fellowship, and the Shaw Summer Fellowship—more than we can afford to help. That’s why we're thankful for our friends who partner with us to insure Image scholarships and fellowships for artists laboring to make ends meet. We hope you’ll consider giving some of these worthy folks a boost. We—and they—would be so grateful.

To discover how you can help artists and writers discover their vocation, read our scholarship appeal letter “Help Emerging Artists Find Their Calling” here.
If you'd like to learn more about how to support Image's programs, write directly to Gregory Wolfe at gwolfe@imagejournal.org.

The World of Richard Dadd by Michael Mott
In his latest book of poems, Michael Mott (Image #11, 31) writes about growing up in London during 1931-1939, the years leading up to World War II. In these poems, universal images of childhood innocence—climbing trees, dressing up for family photographs, playing hide-and-seek games with neighborhood friends—are contrasted with the things that children in 1930’s London were never supposed to know about: “dead babies in Spain,” “bombed hospitals, rickshaws burning in the rain,” and “thieves / having their hands cut off / in a public square of Yemen.” In “We Boys Were Experts,” the narrator recalls being fitted for his own gasmask as a schoolboy. And just like that, The World of Richard Dadd blows to pieces any notion that children can be sheltered from the madness of war. In one of several free verse poems about the criminally insane Victorian painter for whom the book is named, the narrator discusses “The Child’s Problem,” a watercolor that depicts an earnest child playing chess with an unresponsive adult. The child’s situation begins to shed light on the autobiographical poems in the collection as the narrator seems to identify with the young chess-player: he wonders if the adult in the chess game is sleeping or maybe “smiling, no doubt planning, entirely for [his] / own satisfaction, to lose.” If so, Mott writes, “then this particular child will certainly be / astute enough to realize he is about to be cheated in / the cruelest manner imaginable.” In the book’s introductory poem, the lines read almost like a rebuke: “When the children left at home / on their own burned and the Crystal Palace / collapsed to a black frame… I was awake, not dreaming.” The World of Richard Dadd is a wide-awake testimony to those things which did not escape Mott’s awareness as a child, and have not escaped his memory. The images in these poems possess the dreamlike quality of childhood memory, distilled by irony and made lucid with unflinching detail. In the last poem of the collection, what he attributes to Dadd’s paintings might also be said of Mott’s own writing: “As always in his / work, it is the meticulous attention to detail that / amazes—amazes, but also oppresses.”

Click here for more.

If you have information other ImageUpdate readers might find interesting, share it here! Do you have a question that you hope a member of the ImageUpdate community might have the answer to? Ask it here. Have your messages posted by sending an email to gwolfe@spu.edu.

Transforming Culture: A Vision for the Church and the Arts
This symposium brings together pastors, church leaders and artists to discuss the Church's relation to the arts and to artists. If you are interested in exploring the ways in which we can encourage a more theologically informed, biblically grounded, liturgically sensitive, artistically alive and missionally shrewd vision for the Church and the arts, then we welcome you to join us for a stimulating and refreshing two-day conversation April 1-3, 2008. Speakers include Eugene Peterson, Jeremy Begbie, Barbara Nicolosi, Andy Crouch, David Taylor, and John Witvliet.

Substantial discount for pre-Jurassic early bird registration, but it shan't last long—just like the dinosaurs. For registration and additional information, visit our website.

The Art of Worship
Welcoming guest artists Margaret Becker and Janice Elsheimer, the Art of Worship Conference (themed: “In the way? Or in the Way? Get in the Way. Keep moving") invites artists, thinkers, and other creative people to a two-day conference founded to claim and explore the place of art in worship, to connect with the Creator and each other, and to promote the essential inspiration that comes from genuine community. The conference will take place Friday and Saturday, July 13 and 14, 2007, at First Friends Church, 5455 Market Avenue North, Canton, Ohio 44714. To register or more information, click here, call First Friends at (330) 966-2800 ext. 222, or e-mail arts@firstfriends.org.

2007 Awards Program Deadlines Near
The deadline for submitting to the 2007 Faith & Form/IFRAA International Awards Program is fast approaching. Registration for the program must be completed by July 16, and submissions must be made by July 20. The awards program is open to architects, designers, and artists worldwide. Information on the awards program and registration materials can be found on the Faith & Form website. If you have questions, please contact Faith & Form’s Trena McClure at tmcclure@faithandform.com, or call her at: (704) 927-2253.

His Gifts and Presence New England Arts Festival
Join us for the international, interdenominational, His Gifts and Presence New England Arts Festival at the Greater Portland Vineyard, 715 Bridgton St., Westbrook Maine, June 23 2007. We are honored again to have Alvin Ailey's Stephanie Powell perform at the festival and teach a free community dance workshop June 22. Also joining us for this year’s event are artists from Australia (including the head of Art Refuge of Perth), Germany, Russia, the head of Arts for Christ from Cairo, Egypt, and a photographer from South Africa. Also Rebirth Dance Company from London England, Selah Warriors of Praise, dancers from Georgia, dancer Jasmine Bates from California (who ministered extensively at the Potter's House under Bishop T. D. Jakes, with Dr Bobby Jones and TBN), internationally renowned pastel artist David Costello, international speaker/painter Barbara Bagshaw, and Maine's Poet Laureate, Betsy Sholl. Also musicians Lisa Gallant Seal, rap artists Anonymous 1 and Lamar Callahan, and African Gospel Rhythms, with Pastor Pezzy, from Zambia, the Browne Boyz from Pennsylvania, the Warrior Poetes, and many more!

Please check out our website for more.

The S-Word. The Cathedral of Our Lady of the Angels presents The S-Word: The State of ‘Spirituality’ In Contemporary Art through August 24. For more information on the exhibition, contact info@olacathedral.org or (213) 680-5200, or visit www.olacathedral.org.

Still Time to Register for the Glen!
If you’ve been thinking about attending the Glen Workshop this summer, now is a good time to sign up. There are still slots open in Songwriting, Playwriting, Calligraphy, and the Seminar: Peoples of the Book. As of today, the Fiction, Drawing, Poetry, Mosaic, and Spiritual Writing workshops are full—however, we’ve opened up free waitlists, and there’s always a chance that a spot will open up. Give us a call at the number below or send us an e-mail with “waitlist” in the subject line. Include your name, address, phone number, and the course option you'd like to be waitlisted for. With Pierce Pettis as the musician-in-residence, and special appearances by Over the Rhine and Sandra Scofield, this is one Glen not to be missed!

To register, check online to see which classes are filled. Then, go here to register or call us at 206.281.2988.