By Dell Smith Beyond the Margins finally persuaded Dell Smith’s good friend Ryan Gosling to take time out of his busy schedule as an Internet meme to shine a little love our way. Give it up
“My definition (for myself) of a working title is: A title that doesn’t work.” Robin Black Picture having a baby. You named that baby so soon after conception. Dear
It’s funny how folks who work at home (writers, painters, composers, phone-sex workers, though not those who use Skype visuals) will so often use “working in my pajamas! as their
The only thing I didn’t love about Diamond Ruby by Joseph Wallace was finishing it, because then it was over and I had to leave her world. Lucky you, you
Halloween is all about haunting. The unrelenting hold of ghosts. The unbearable-to-resist sweetness of candy. Ghosts that haunt are products of the living: relatives dead and alive, past loves, remembered
I’ve worked with men who battered their wives, their girlfriends, their sisters, and sometimes their mothers. For almost ten years, I listened to their stories as they admitted bullying,
Every now and then an article leaps out of the paper and punches me in the chest. (Actually, this should probably happen with 90% of the articles printed. Sometimes I
“It happened this way: I fell in love and then, because the love was ruining everything I cared about, I had to fall out. This didn’t happen easily, or simply,
“The day my mother killed herself, she had just finished preparing her house on Marlborough Street for the anticipated return of her children after a fierce custody battle with my
Seven years ago my mother called my sister and me to tell us she had cancer. The doctor gave her less than a year to live. Despite years of complicated
What makes you buy a book? Is it different from what makes you watch a movie? Pick a television show? It seems so, because it’s so private—just you and the
How many writers come up without help? None, I’d venture to guess. Most writers can point to someone who made the difference for them—whether it was as a long-term
Living in a violent home is like growing up in a war zone. When a woman is battered, images of their mother being beaten will be imprinted on them forever.
I belong to what might be one of the longest running women’s groups in the country. We began during the era of consciousness-raising (mothers in our early 20s, we discussed
“Wondering how many powerful and heartbreaking novels would not have been written if there were no dysfunctional families.” Kris The above was the Facebook ‘status’ of a dear friend (in
What’s the word for impotent worry activated by reading the morning paper? When your mind swirls with horror at people’s pain and you think of how you can effect, perhaps,
In the continuous stream of NPR that is my life, I learned that Jerri Nielson died of breast cancer. Dr. Nielson wrote a book I’ve read more than once, and
For ten years I co-led groups for violent men. I sat in a circle with a male co-leader and anywhere from 8 to 18 men who’d been violent with their
Guest Post by Robin Black (originally published in Beyond The Margins) It’s almost New Year’s resolution time. I have a few this year. All the usual ones about less food,
Whatever his politics, and I am certain we’d disagree far more than agree, I bless Senator Scott Brown for revealing the sexual and physical abuse he suffered as a child.
A few weeks ago I followed my usual pre-work routine: I poured coffee and opened the Boston Globe. Then I flinched at the too familiar headline: Two dead, one on life
When I taught in a batterer intervention program—an educational, not counseling program—we’d draw a triangle on the board to help the men look at their belief system. During this lesson
“I am not a hero. I stand at the end of the long, long line of good Dutch people who did what I did or more—much more—during those dark and
Belts being made into threatening weapons — that’s one of the clearest childhood memories. Being called “Hitela” (for Hitler) was my mother’s way of reminding me how awful she thought