Corresponding with writers and bibliophiles about what we've been reading lately.
Emily Lang is a writer, teaching artist,
and mother. With fifteen years of experience creating and facilitating
workshops for youth and adult writers, she’s witnessed the power of putting pen
to paper to build a world beyond our wounds. Guided by compassion, Emily’s work
examines the act of loving and re-imagines a world where healing, after harm,
exists. As bell hooks says: “how do we hold people
accountable for wrongdoing and yet at the same time remain in touch with their
humanity enough to believe in their capacity to be transformed?” Each
time she returns to the page, she asks herself this.
Nate: Congratulations
on your lovely new book the sun & the moon & the stars: a
workbook for writers. Can you tell me a bit about the genesis of this
project? Am I right in understanding that the book grew out of writing
workshops you led?
Emily: Thank you so much, Nate! I'm very honored it lives in your home and in the world. And, yes, the sun & the moon & the stars: a workbook for writers was born out of the curriculum I created in 2022 for an online writing workshop series called I Would Rather Be the Moon. In August of 2021, my daughter's father died by suicide and a few days after, I resigned from my thirteen-year career as a public-school teacher. The circumstances that led to these events were dark, and writing became a place for me to process the things I wasn't ready, or able, to speak about.
I originally created the series to accompany me alongside my journey of writing a memoir, but it ended up being a space for community and healing. I met with thirty-three writers every week over the course of three months: March (the sun), July (the moon), and September (the stars). Each month had a different central focus: for the sun we wrote about our firsts and pasts, for the moon we wrote about our darkness and duality, and for the stars we wrote about our visions for our future selves and the way we wished the world to be.
Nate: The book is designed to be written in and each section has lined pages like a journal for writing assignments. There are also numerous graphical writing prompts that look helpful. For instance, there's an "Imagery Builder" that is laid out like a calendar of the alphabet, and a "Timeline of Memories" designed as an actual horizontal timeline. How did you develop techniques like these, did they also grow out of your teaching?
Emily: Yes. These techniques were developed from different
teaching and learning strategies I gained via my work as a public-school
teacher. In my experience in both traditional classroom settings and workshop
spaces, it's important to open with a community builder and/or writing exercise
that comes with low stakes, and also to provide participants the
opportunity to make a connection to the theme or assignment. I think the
traditional system of education has made writing intimidating or off-putting
because we tend to place more value on grammar or mechanics as opposed to ideas
or creativity. The actual act of writing or getting things outside of our
bodies and on to paper is beneficial, no matter its form. Making a list or
writing a recipe is writing. The writing exercises provide a bridge to the more
in-depth prompts but also pay homage to the various ways we use writing to
function in our daily lives.
Nate: With that conception of the writerly act in mind, how do you envision writers "using writing" when engaging with your book?
Emily: Sometimes I imagine my book being used like the diary
you had as a kid, something you kept hidden in your dresser drawer and the
place where you recorded your secrets and thoughts and wishes. I also
envision it being used as a starting point for larger projects, as the
questions to consider and writing prompts are broad and open-ended. It was
important for me to include different forms of writing within the book to
encourage people to use the act to unearth things within themselves, and that
entry point looks different for everyone.
Nate: Can I ask about the role that writing has played in
your own recovery process?
Emily: I can say with no hyperbole that writing helped bring
me back to sanity and recover from not only the traumatic loss of my former
partner, but also a decade of emotional and psychological abuse. There's so
much irony in my story and the ways in which my work and personal life have
interconnected. For thirteen years, I co-created spaces with young people that
encouraged them to use writing to define their own narrative, heal from painful
experiences, and express their joy in free and unfiltered ways. The longer I
taught, however, the less I wrote personally because I was living within
conditions that were disorienting and I couldn't access my own feelings. The
day after Kristopher died, I sat in my stairwell for hours and started writing
in a note on my phone where I attempted to explain to myself what I had
experienced. It was rarely in sentences, rather bits, spurts, moments, little
things he said when he was alive. Memories or epiphanies I’ve had. It
felt like my reality was slowly being revealed to me through my writing and two
years later, I still sit in my stairwell almost every day and write.
I also feel it's important to note that writing wasn't
the only healing practice I engaged in. I went to talk therapy
twice a week for the first six months, then once a week for an entire year
before adding length between my visits. I’ve spent an enormous amount of time in
solitude, and in nature, to restore my sense of internal safety and move beyond
living in a hypervigilant state. I believe writing can serve as a critical
component in one's healing and recovery process, especially for the parts we
don't have the capacity to speak out loud in the beginning phases.
Nate: Thank you so much for sharing this. Your experience really speaks to the power of written language. Your book also encourages reading alongside writing. There are excellent "Suggested Reading" selections for all twelve weeks. How did you approach the research for matching readings to writing assignments? Are there certain authors you found especially resonant while teaching workshops and writing your book?
Emily: Someone once told me if you want to be a better writer
you need to read more. I also believe words find me when/as I need them, and
each of the recommended readings paired with the weekly lessons came from my
personal bookshelf, as well as my teaching from the last thirteen years. When I
begin to conceptualize a workshop or weekly lesson, I create a document or
note on my phone and throw ideas, content, poems, etc. in it as they come to
me. I'm constantly engaging with different forms of media and thinking
about how things could be used as inspiration or conversation with a group, so
matching reading to writing assignments is a natural part of the process and I
find a lot of joy in piecing together the puzzle (that could be put
together in a number of different ways).
I gravitate towards stories written by women, stories written
by marginalized people, and stories that speak truthfully about our shame, our
pain, and our mistakes. I noticed that the participants in my workshops felt
similarly and benefited from the amplification of voices who are often left out
of the conversation.
Nate: What are a few of your favorite works in that vein,
titles you find yourself returning to?
Emily: You know how people have comfort movies? I have
comfort books. Truth & Beauty by Ann Patchett is one of them.
It is a beautiful and tragic story about a best friendship, and I resonate so
deeply with the type of love Ann and Lucy shared, as well as the darker parts
of their dependence on each other. Also, I tend to pick up Ocean Vuong's On
Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous often, which is a novel that reads like
poetry and feels so utterly full of gratitude, while honoring the uglier parts
of his truth.
To be honest, I've struggled to read anything new this summer and I think it's just where I'm at right now. I spent a lot of time in solitude getting lost in other people's worlds but in a way that allowed me to make sense of my own, and this summer I've craved more connection. I take bell hooks' all about love with me to bed each night and read at least a paragraph or a page. Her straightforward approach is so digestible and pure to me, and I recommend it to anyone seeking a life rooted in love as action.
Nate: I definitely second your appreciation of bell hooks. Adrien and I read The Will to Change last year - a book that largely addresses men - and it was both incredibly profound and, as you put it, straightforward. She's an author to be savored, I need to read a lot more of her.
I have a few Ann Patchett books on my to-read list, glad you've given me an extra nudge there. I was just reading a review of her new novel Tom Lake, that sounds terrific too.
Your book reminds me of an interesting novel I read recently called The Interrogative Mood by Padgett Powell. It was given to me as a gift by my mother-in-law Donna Miller who, incidentally, is a great reader and prolific writer herself! The novel is composed entirely of questions; I mean, every sentence in the book is a question. The identities of the asker and the asked are hinted at but never quite made clear. As the book progresses you start to sense that you, the reader, are the "character" being addressed and your identity is being slowly revealed through your silent internal responses to the questions, some of which are highly charged (although others are lighthearted, and some are downright bizarre).
The reason I think of your book in connection with The Interrogative Mood is that it's a participatory work. While the reader isn't invited to actually write in the pages, it certainly provokes a layered dialogue between book and reader, reader and self. Likewise, you ask potent questions in the sun & the moon & the stars, like "Why do we lie?" and "Is healing, after harm, possible?" These are character-defining prompts that put readers/writers in conversation with themselves as complex individuals, as much as with you the author and teacher.
Emily: I'm
definitely checking out a copy of The Interrogative Mood from
the library as soon as I finish answering this question! I'm fascinated by the
concept of an entire novel being written in questions, and also how you
described the connection between the novel and my workbook as
"character-defining prompts that put readers/writers in conversation with
themselves as complex individuals." This is the intention of my workbook
but also the goal of healing, and growing, in my opinion. When we are in constant
conversation with ourselves about our experiences, we develop a deeper
understanding of why we move through the world in such a way, and when we are
able to see the connection or the roots, we have the ability to disrupt toxic
patterns and elevate our awareness of how to move differently. I also believe
that the deeper we understand ourselves, the more we have the capacity to
practice compassion with others, and compassion is a critical component of
moving away from punitive responses to harm and towards environments that
support accountability and restoration instead.
