Erika Dreifus

Most Fridays the Practicing Writing blog shares writing and publishing resources, news, and reflections to peruse over the weekend. But it’s been an excruciating week for so many of us. And frankly, I’ve paid next-to-no attention to garden-variety news from the writing and publishing spheres.

On Wednesday, however, I received an email from Facing History and Ourselves, a Boston-based global nonprofit organization that I’ve admired for many years. The email introduced a “mini-lesson” titled “Processing Attacks in Israel and the Outbreak of War in the Region.”

The resource isn’t perfect. (What resource is?) But one of its segments impressed me as something that, though intended for educators and students, could be clarifying for writers as well, in our work and in the rest of our lives. It’s a section titled “Avoiding Antisemitic and Islamophobic Tropes in Discussing Israeli-Palestinian Conflict.”

• I spent part of last weekend reading the print edition of The Atlantic, and I loved James Parker’s “An Ode to My Thesaurus” at the issue’s conclusion.
• Mark your calendars: The next iteration of Jami Attenberg’s “Mini” #1000WordsOfSummer “will be held August 7-12, 2022. We will write 1000 words a day for 6 days straight, and you will get a letter each morning” from Attenberg.
• Gratitude to Trish Hopkinson, who has announced that her very useful resource website will be going on hiatus.
• If you have a few moments to help out an MFA candidate: Leslie Stonebraker is surveying writers about “the writing life” for her upcoming VCFA graduating lecture (deadline: August 3).
• And there’s a new set of Jewish-lit links over on the My Machberet blog, kicking off with some essential words about Anne Frank’s diary from critic and biographer Ruth Franklin.

Here’s to a good, safe weekend for everyone.