Tag: CT humanities

Why Do The Humanities Matter To You?

March 19, 2015 / Katie L. Carroll

Today’s post is discussing a serious matter regarding the defunding of the humanities in my home state of Connecticut. My hope is that you (residents and non-residents alike) will join me in a rallying cry to help the state realize the importance of the humanities. I’m asking that you share in the comments what the humanities mean to you and how they have affected your life.

The situation is that Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy has proposed a new 2-year budget that would eliminate funding for the Connecticut Humanities Council, the Connecticut Trust for Historic Preservation, and the Community Investment Act. I know most of you who read my blog are of the mind that the humanities matter, but lets reiterate that here, today: the humanities matter. Let’s put human faces on why they matter.

What are the humanities? Stanford University Humanities Center has a wonderful definition on their website:

“The humanities can be described as the study of how people process and document the human experience. Since humans have been able, we have used philosophy, literature, religion, art, music, history and language to understand and record our world. These modes of expression have become some of the subjects that traditionally fall under the humanities umbrella. Knowledge of these records of human experience gives us the opportunity to feel a sense of connection to those who have come before us, as well as to our contemporaries.”

So, no, we’re not talking about the physical necessities of life like food and shelter. What we are talking about with the humanities is food for our souls, connection to others, a sense of where we’ve come from and where we’re going as people. They bring us a better understanding of our world, past, present, and future. We’re talking about what it means to be human; the very essence of the word “humanity.”

That’s a beautiful sentiment in and of itself, but let’s get specific about what’s at stake. If the proposed budget in Connecticut is passed, it will cut about two-thirds of the Connecticut Humanities budget. These funds go towards cultural organizations, historical societies, libraries, and educational institutions throughout the state. They support the Connecticut Center for the Book, the Connecticut Book Award, book talks, poetry festivals, and workshops for children.

These are the funds that made THE GREAT CONNECTICUT CAPER possible. The Caper, a collaborative, serialized mystery for middle grade readers, is near and dear to me as I am one of the twelve Connecticut authors who wrote a chapter for it. Once chapter 12 is released in June, any future plans to reach out further to libraries and schools to make the story more accessible and plans to develop an audio book of it will not be realized.

I was lucky enough to teach a writing workshop at a Connecticut middle school through the Caper. Seven sixth-graders in the special education program won the workshop by writing their own chapter for the Caper, and an additional 23 students got the attend the workshop. We talked about where creative ideas come from, and I took them through a writing exercise to help them begin to develop their own creative stories. What an enthusiastic and creative bunch of kids! I was just floored when they shared the ideas that had grown from the workshop.

That was all made possible by support for Connecticut humanities. So now I’m turning to you to bring attention to the humanities in Connecticut. Share your thoughts in the comments and talk about it on social media using #CTHumanitiesMatter, #CTPlacesMatter, and #CTHistoryMatters.

Connecticut residents can e-mail their legislators (find yours here) stating who you are, how the humanities are important to you, and letting them know what activities you participate in that will be impacted. You can also contact Governor Malloy through this link. Join the rally day in Hartford at the state capitol on April 8 (details here).

Now you’re up! Why do the humanities matter? What do they mean to you? I’m hoping to share some of the responses (with the commenters permission, of course) next week on the blog.

Yelizaveta P. Renfro on Writing Chapter One of the Great CT Caper

January 5, 2015 / Katie L. Carroll

Writing the First Chapter

by Yelizaveta P. Renfro

The assignment: to write the first chapter of The Great Connecticut Caper, a serialized storybook that would be created by twelve different writers and twelve different illustrators living in Connecticut.

The target audience: children in grades four through seven.

The premise: Gillette Castle is going missing!

The challenge: to create an engaging, fast-paced opening chapter that would introduce sympathetic characters and lay out some basic plot elements. And to do it in under 650 words.

The process: The first step was research. We made a family trip to Gillette Castle in East Haddam where we learned about William Gillette, the eccentric actor who brought Sherlock Holmes to life on the stage and who designed his twenty-four room mansion to resemble the ruin of a medieval castle. We toured the home, looking at hidden passageways and the surveillance system based on strategically placed mirrors, and we wandered the grounds, admiring his personal railroad track as well as his woods and views of the Connecticut River.

But we weren’t done yet. On another weekend, we took a ride on the Essex Steam Train and the Becky Thatcher Riverboat, learning about the Connecticut River, getting a different vantage point of Gillette Castle from the water, and discovering more about William Gillette.

As a writer, I often start projects with research. And as a parent, I often take my kids along. But this assignment was different. I am primarily a writer of books for adults, and this project was writing for children. Luckily, I had my own kids to consult.

So after the research stage, I had a long brainstorming session with my fourth grader (with the first grader listening in and offering occasional advice). We discussed what makes a good story and interesting characters. We talked about mystery books for children. We tossed around ideas for the story and possible character names. The fourth grader taught me how to make a character map, and she created several for possible characters. The first grader made one as well.

We agreed early on that the protagonists should be children, and that there should be two of them—a boy and a girl. (We discussed Ron Roy’s and Mary Pope Osborne’s books as examples.) The names and character traits of the boy and girl kept changing, but we finally settled on Thomas and Li-Ming. And during a long walk through our neighborhood, the fourth grader and I discussed different possible openings. Should the protagonists be touring the castle? Should they be on a riverboat cruise? What other characters should be introduced? What should happen at the end of the chapter?

There would be a cliffhanger, we decided, so readers would want to tune in for the following installment. And we needed to create openings for other writers to build the story—characters who could be further developed, situations that could be interpreted in more than one way.

Finally, once we had hashed out everything, I wrote the chapter. The first draft came in at over 900 words. So then I cut, and I cut some more. And finally, when the chapter was just under 650 words, I read it to my kids. They loved it. But they also had a few suggestions. I revised. I read it again.

It was a process of learning together. I shared what I knew about storytelling with my kids, and they shared what they knew with me.

The outcome: See for yourself at http://ctcaper.cthumanities.org where the first chapter was posted on January 4. And please check back every two weeks as more chapters go live. I am looking forward to seeing where the story goes from here. And so are my kids.

About the Author:

Yelizaveta P. Renfro is the author of a collection of essays, Xylotheque, available from the University of New Mexico Press, and a collection of short stories, A Catalogue of Everything in the World, winner of the St. Lawrence Book Award. Her fiction and nonfiction have appeared in Glimmer Train Stories, North American Review, Orion, Colorado Review, Alaska Quarterly Review, South Dakota Review, Witness, Reader’s Digest, Blue Mesa Review, Parcel, Adanna, Fourth River, Bayou Magazine, Untamed Ink, So to Speak, and elsewhere. She holds an MFA in creative writing from George Mason University and a Ph.D. in English from the University of Nebraska. Currently a resident of Connecticut, she’s also lived in California, Virginia, and Nebraska. To learn more about her work, visit her blog at http://chasingsamaras.blogspot.com/p/writing.html.

Visiting Gillette’s Castle for the Great CT Caper

September 23, 2014 / Katie L. Carroll

Last week I dragged the whole family up to the Connecticut River Valley for a trip to Gillette’s Castle. Okay, there wasn’t really any dragging involved. I mean, who wouldn’t want to visit a medieval-style castle overlooking a gorgeous river valley? And the kiddos are still too little to protest much over what family activities we do. 🙂

I was there to do research for writing my chapter of the Great CT Caper, which starts next week! So far all I know for the story is that the castle is going to go missing…and the rest is up to us writers to create.

There’s nothing quite like physically experiencing the place you are writing about, so off we went. The morning rain scared away all the tourists (plus it was a Tuesday), so we had run of the place almost to ourselves. I had already done 664 (1) some research on William Gillette who designed and lived in the castle.

Gillette is probably best known for portraying Sherlock Holmes on stage. Seems he had quite the sense of humor and was a natural entertainer because his home was set up to simultaneously awe his guests and tease them. He had strategically placed mirrors so he could spy on his guests from other rooms, one of which he used to observe his guests struggle with a trick liquor cabinet that Gillette designed. He also had a secret shortcut on his main stairway so he could beat his guests up to the great room and surprise them.

All in all I took a million pictures (many a little blurry because The Prince was strapped to me via the Moby wrap and it made it hard for me to keep my phone steady) and learned way more information than I’ll ever be able to cram into a whole story never mind a single chapter. But I also got really inspired and earned a whole new sense of the castle that I never would have gotten from pictures and descriptions of it. I do hope I get to incorporate a little of that into my small part in the story.

Join Me on the Great CT Caper

September 9, 2014 / Katie L. Carroll

Finally the time has come to let you all know about that collaborative project I’ve been teasing you about. (I know, you’ve just been dying of curiosity, haven’t you?) Drum roll, please…

Join me, 11 other Connecticut authors, and 12 Connecticut illustrators as one of our own state’s cultural treasures is about to go missing. The Great CT Caper is on! The plot will develop as each author tackles one chapter at a time, but it all starts with the missing treasure, which was on voted on by the people. And they selected Gillette Castle!

Gillette Castle was designed by William Gillette, who was actually Sherlock Holmes (on stage anyway!), as a private residence and is now part of a state park. High above the gorgeous Connecticut River, I can’t imagine a better place for a mystery to take place. As part of my research, I’ll be visiting it later this month and I’ll be sure to share my experience here on the blog.

With the Great CT Caper, the Connecticut Center for the Humanities will be the first to publish a state-specific version of a serialized story for young readers modeled after a national one done by the Library of Congress. Starting in January 2015, the story will be published online one nail-biting chapter at a time.

I think it’s going to be an amazingly fun project to work on. I’ve never collaborated on a story with so many different writers and I’m really excited to see what kind of story comes out of it. Have any of you ever co-written or done a collaborative book?