I am a published and award winning playwright, produced television, screenwriter, blogger and YouTuber.
UNRULY WOMEN and other stories are about life and living in Baja California, Mexico. I moved here in 2011 when I was 71. Best decision I ever made.
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Dear Carol Roper,
I don’t think you will remember me. Many years ago, in the early seventies, you were in residence at Johnson State College with a theater company (whose name escapes me at the moment), and I was there teaching in an Upward Bound Program. I’d left my three and a half year teaching position in Michigan– after graduating with an MFA in Fiction Writing at the Iowa Writers Workshop– and driven off to Vermont to write because I couldn’t get any writing done teaching 15 hours full-time. I wrote my first stories, unsupported by school, while waitressing in Vermont that year. I sat in on a playwriting class taught by Connie Bromberg. I hung out with the company and that influenced me in deciding to move to NYC the next year. I asked if you’d read a story of mine, the first long serious story I’d ever written. I called it “The Long Story.” You were the first professional woman writer I’d ever met (none teaching at Iowa then). You gave me helpful feedback, kindly, and sent me an encouraging postcard with a perspective about the destiny of any writer. In short, you took me seriously and encouraged me at a time when I was quite fragile.
I am now publishing a short story collection and that story, much revised, is the title, If You Think Your Heart Can Take It. Recently I was cleaning out old letters and found your postcard. I am mentioning you in my acknowledgements. Thank you for generously offering your time and expertise to a young fiction writer.
It is lovely to read about what you’ve been doing and where you are.
All the best to you,
Suzanne McConnell
You can reach me at Suzannekmcconnell@gmail.com. My website is https://www.suzannemcconnell.com/
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Dear Suzanne, Thank you. There is no greater compliment I can receive than to learn I have encouraged another human to ruin their eyes and mental health and break their hearts over and over by devoting themselves to the life of a writer. I jest in part, every joke holds a truth.
The name of the theater group was Curt Dempster’s, Ensemble Studio Theatre. Though Curt left the planet in 2007, the Ensemble Studio Theatre is still active in the same location in NYC.
I am delighted and impressed to hear of your achievement. Short stories are the most challenging form and I still struggle with it. Congratulations. I will be sure to read your work.
Thank you for contacting me and for including me in your acknowledgements.
Love and peace Carol
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