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Today’s Write Now interview features Larry Atlas, actor, playwright, and screenwriter turned author and healthcare provider
For the early part of my work life, I was an actor and playwright, then a screenwriter
In an impulsive but serendipitous career change in midlife, I became a nurse and then a nurse
I was a hospitalist for ten years, and currently am the principal health care provider at a
I’d use the typewriter in the company’s orderly room after the staff had left for
I especially loved that, writing for and working with actors; that led, in turn, to screenwriting, which
Obviously, all writing draws on personal experience, but I tend to avoid the specifically autobiographical
Although writing can certainly be arduous, at least for me, I do love it
I love the way words and phrases and sentences come together
For many years I worked on an amazing IBM Executive with proportional spacing
Even if the words didn’t read well, they always looked beautiful
We live in the country, and our house has a little library where I write
I usually write in the morning, after coffee and catching up on the news
Usually, I’ll write for about three hours though I don’t set limits; as long as
And at the moment, with time obligations to patients, my writing schedule is sometimes more flexible
I didn’t mind deadlines as I think of myself as somewhat lazy
Well, I love the feeling that comes with writing well, of finding the right word, making the
I had a composer friend who described hearing melody and rhythm and harmony in the voices of
An architect friend tells me he sees the world in terms of shape and line and volumes
I suppose I experience the world primarily in words and the way people around me use them
Basically, I’m inspired by great writing, in serious literary fiction certainly, but sometimes even in more
First, I’ll try to read something really good, often a poem, sometimes even a few lines,
Next, if that doesn’t work, I’ll go back a good distance in whatever I’m
I also exercise fairly religiously, daily for an hour or so, necessary maintenance at this point, but