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I learn so much from pastors, and I'll be blogging about one such pastor soon, and I've learned that I learn so much because we learn from one another. Pastors sometimes write me about cracking the code of a passage so they can preach it well, and I write to them about wisdom for preaching.  But this isn't one of those Will Strunk -- E.B. White books that tells us to use good grammar or spell words properly, and there's a place for those books. I've worn mine proudly. Instead, McEntyre's book reads like a testament of love for the words this professor has learned. She's been teaching students to love poetry and novels and how to write. She's a master of words, and this book is lavishly dotted here and there with story and quotation, and pastors would do well to learn to care about and for words. Your prayers and the preaching will improve.

I don't have a commonplace book, and were I to begin, I would surely fall behind, even if it would be a rush of joy for me just to sit down to write with one of my fountain pens. How do I come up with quotes? I don't, and never will, use a quotation book. That is cheating for me. Public speakers use books like that; I'm a reader and a writer and scholar. That means I've got to find my own quotations. Here's what works for me - not that I think I'm all that good at it. Three shelves of books sit next to my desk. These books are my "writers" whose books contain generous underlining from my previous readings. I could list them, but they go back to Homer and the classical writings in both Greek and Latin, and then I jump forward to Augustine and Dante, and then onto Shakespeare, Montaigne, Addison and Steele ... a basic chronological approach. I end with Eco, Nancy Mairs, R. Scott Brunner, and V.S. Naipaul. When I am writing something, I open some of these books and beg, borrow, and steal quotations. My favorites, of course, are those who twist life into a tangy juice - like Flannery O'Connor, or who draw their own smoke - like Isaiah Berlin. Sometimes Bacon can generate a new thought, othertimes Hazlitt can provide the chosen word, and on other occasions C.S. Lewis brushes the mountains with the clouds of magic. But there they sit, my friends.

Great authors can sometimes be found in magazines and journals. I subscribe to some academic journals for my field and, like the evening shadow, they are covering the entire room with their shades. Others are for just reading and learning. So I subscribe to The Jerusalem Report, which is a nosy magazine about Israel. I read Commentary, which is knowledgeable about Israel's place in the international context. Its writers are intelligent and they write for those who want to think about the right side of political power in the world. I also take Gilbert! but this will be the last year I read it. There is too much dreck and ephemeral writing by sentimental Chesterton fans, even if I appreciate Dale Ahlquist and various bits and bobs in the glossy magazine. I read The New York Review of Books and First Things (but not one after the other!).

Shelves, by the way, do make a difference. If my books had made me famous or wealthy (I'd prefer the latter over the former), and if publishers thought of me as someone worth marketing lavishly (which they don't), I would have a library of books housed caringly in Levenger bookcases (which I don't have). You know the kind: stackable, individual shelves, each with a glass door engraved ("History: Ancient," or "Essayists: American"), and made of solid, honest-to-goodness oak. They would surround my room, some four feet high, some five, and some eight or nine. Above the four feet high shelves would be art work from the finest - "finest" for me means Rembrandt and Carravagio, not Picasso or any of the modernists who, like fiction writers, make up their own world. I've got but one bookshelf like this and it is what the Germans call a billige Nachahmung. It is about five feet high, stands proudly in our living room on a wooden floor, and presents our set of Dickens, some of the Great Books of the Western World, some of Bonhoeffer in German, some baseball books, and a half shelf of my own (paperback) books. On it sits pictures of our two children, and behind them a nice clock (always, as my wife insists, set about 7-10 minutes ahead).

So, in desultory style, I bought another of Epstein's familiar essays (which he defines as a "line out for a walk"), and then before the summer was out I had read seven books of familiar essays and four books of literary criticism, and I was ready for any and all that he was writing or editing. So, I bought his The Norton Book of Personal Essays. Done with his (true) books, I mustered the courage to write him a note of appreciation and began to tell my friends to read him. My dad found him wonderful, and that matters because he is my dad and because he is a retired English teacher who likes authors who can make a page an anticipation of blessings. What Joseph Epstein does is make every page a delight to read, regardless of the topic - and he writes about everything. He does so with élan, with wit, and a touch of gentle cynicism as his tarragon.

These sorts of questions and authors have kept me from reading much fiction. It is not that I don't appreciate the authors - I often read biographies of fiction writers - or that I don't think they have had their...

My heart, for instance, jumped when I recently re-read Dante Alighieri's (whom a Texan friend refers to as "Danny, Ally, and Gerry") The Divine Comedy, which title takes some brushing up against some intelligent folks to comprehend. I liked Dante,...

This is an unpublished essay I wrote a few years back and want to post it this and next week while we are in Italy wandering from one Tuscan village to another. Enjoy...Never Alone"...the truth that reading and its necessary...

At Messiah College last week I was asked three different times this question: "How do you manage to get all the teaching, speaking and writing done?" OK, I've talked about this before, but I'd like to have a conversation about...

Good writers have an honest, authentic, living voice, and that is one thing that is about as clear as it gets with Karen Spears Zacharias in her new book Where's Your Jesus Now? Her father was killed in Viet Nam....

Karen Spears Zacharias, like other writers, can't write without it becoming memoir-ish and personal and personally divulging. So, in Where's Your Jesus Now?, she doesn't just talk about fear; she reveals her own fears. I wonder if pastors deal much...

Karen Spears Zacharias is a born storyteller, and that is why I want to commend to you her new book Where's Your Jesus Now?. I became aware of Karen at our local Barnes & Noble when I happened one evening...

Read good writers. This is perhaps not said enough: we write more like the people we read than we perhaps know. Those who read all academic textbooks and reference books, as both undergrads and grads tend to do, are influenced...

Dear Scot, Have you ever blogged about your daily rhythm? I love your blog, but I always wonder how you write so much (and keep your inbox clear)? How do you sleep very much, do housework, play with your son,...

It's about time for me to toot a bit about the glory of writing with a fountain pen. Now before you ask, I've provided a link to Amazon if you want to see some Fountain Pens. About five times a...

I got to clean off my desk. The Blue Parakeet lasted a long time and my desk kept getting messier and messier. Here are some pre- and post- pictures... Pre... Post... I must confess a sadness. When a book is...

We have an old desk top iMac on which Lukas set up for us the iTunes player. One of the very few things I can do is find "Scot's Favorites" and click it as I begin my day of study....

We have to put someone's IP address or e-mail address on a list that recognizes that address and holds the comment for approval. (The same filter sometimes catches some of our regular commenters unintentionally.) However, this post is not about...

When are you most creative? Or, should I put it more profoundly: When are you most yourself? In the early hours of the day, before most others have awakened, or after midnight, when most have gone on to the rest...

In one brief prohibition: If you have written a book, don't create a blog to market your book. Now an explanation: I've been consulted by a bundle of authors and publishers to ask "How did you build your blog?" The...

I got a letter from a pastor up in Seattle, and in it he had these questions: --how many book do you usually have going at a time? --how do you mark-up/make notes in your books? --how do you file/make...

Recently I was filling up my Visconti Van Gogh fountain pen, drawing ink through the converter from a bottle of Parker black ink, when I somehow got a little ink on my finger. I wondered if anyone would notice, not...

Matt Wiebe, one of our blogfriends, is wondering about something. Is it academically responsible to cite a blog? Are they reliable sources? You can make comments here, of course, but I'd like to know if "research methods" teachers (at any...

1. To ape some old words, one can either write a blog or read a blog, but one can't normally be good at both. Personally speaking, I've not done as well at the latter as Kris has and I've not...

Last night as I sat at a table to sign a copy of The Real Mary for someone who asked, a very kind young woman from England, Helen, observed that she liked my fountain pen. Which of course made me...

I was reading a post at another blog this week when a thought occurred to me that had been triggered by a letter to me from RJS (a faithful blog reader here). This blogger, and I have no desire to...

Folks regularly write to me to tell me they appreciate that I'm accessible on this blog, and the letters I'm getting are both encouraging and in need of a little bit of a response. The first thing I want you...

If I've been asked this once, I've been asked it 500 times: "How do you do it?" And by that my questioners want to know how I have time to teach, write books, take care of this blog, and speak...

I must confess something: I love seminaries. Other than the obvious -- teaching and training pastors and missionaries and evangelists and the like -- what I like most is the rhetorical level. Using theological words brings me pleasure, the kind...

After four days of editing my Mary ms, I'm about to write a brief note to my editor, Lil Copan, to tell her that writing in green instead of red doesn't lessen the pain. Sure, sure, I'll tell her, the...

Yesterday, sitting in the living room sipping on coffee and peeking out the picture window, I was waiting for the FedEx man to arrive at our home because the edited manuscript of The Real Mary was scheduled to arrive before...

Jordon Cooper, blogger par excellence (I used that French because he's Canadian and want to establish a little credibility), posted about me yesterday and I aim to set the record straight today. He wonders if there is a clone out...

If I were to go back to the beginning of my academic career, say when I began teaching and writing, what would I do differently that would help my reading and writing? That's an easy one, because I know exactly...

The blog yesterday about my desk and what I thought was clutter, but which I've now learned was quite tidy, generated a question: How to mark the books I read? Well, that's a good one because I've given it more...

I speak for myself, but by the time I have finished a writing project my desk has gotten so cluttered it embarrasses me. The first thing I do after I print out the manuscript or send off the electronic versions...

From Michael Russell, who hails from College Station, TX: I cdnuolt blveiee taht I cluod aulaclty uesdnatnrd waht I was rdanieg. The phaonmneal pweor of the hmuan mnid, aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht...

I don't blog much on Saturdays and Sundays. But, I've been away and now it is all spilling out. So... here's a bit to read on defining memoirs. Here's a good link on Memoirs at Inkspell. Here's another: Memoir Cafe....

Some years ago I was writing a letter to my good student-friend, Akiva Cohen. He had written to me and closed off with something in Hebrew, so I thought I'd sign off to him in Hebrew. I used the word...

If you are going to spend some money on a Christmas present, I reason to myself, you might as well spend it on something that will last. So, I suggest a fountain pen if you are so inclined: 1. Waterman...

A recent meandering through the new biographies at Barnes & Noble confronted me one more time with a bald fact of our time: people want to read biographies with salacious details or biographies of celebrities who have achieved -- well,...

I ranted about Bic pens and that 57 of those little basters (a favorite word in Maine) have sold every second since the 1950s. Then I had to offer something in its place -- ranting without a constructive solution is...

If you want to purchase a fountain pen, I'll give you some tips. Unless you're wealthy and can toss gobs of money into corners you may never again visit, I suggest that you get a good fountain pen catalog and...

Today I heard that Biro has now accounted for 100 billion Bic pens -- disposable, now clogging up pipes, glutting our dump yards, and defying the world's nature decomposition. So, let me urge you to stop buying Bics, buy a...

I'm sitting here this morning trying to figure out why we call today "Labor" Day. A quick glance through Wikipedia's entries on "Labour Day", reveals that Labor Day is connected to the celebration of the contribution of workers to our...

The following is a lecture I gave at North Park, and at a few other places and in a few different forms. It studies "liberal arts" and then encourages writing. I shared some of these in a previous blog, enough...

The following is a chunk of an address I gave to our Faculty. The address was called "The Professor as Scholar," and some of it was devoted to some ideas about writing. Here are some of those suggestions.First, writing is...

Every writer likes to talk about writing, the way golfers want to talk about golfing and parents want to talk about kids, and travellers talk about where they've been. I've been asked by some e-mailers and bloggers to talk about...

An interesting discussion for me is whether or not to call this Emergent "thing" a "church" or a "movement" or a "conversation." Let me weigh in with these thoughts, and then suggest what I think is the quintessential literary form...