by Zoe M. McCarthy | May 30, 2013 | Creating
“The secret to humor is surprise. ” — Aristotle We know humor adds much to engaging an audience. This is true whether our works are art pieces, presentations, dramas, novels, short stories or non-fiction. But we also know humor, unlike other elements in our creative...
by Zoe M. McCarthy | May 23, 2013 | Leading
“Communicating an idea juxtaposed with its polar opposite creates energy. Moving back and forth between the contradictory poles encourages full engagement from the audience.” —Nancy Duarte You step back from your creative work and, no matter how hard you rationalize...
by Zoe M. McCarthy | Apr 4, 2013 | Leading
“We have met the enemy and they is us.” — Ashleigh Brilliant We want people to love our creative works, but find critics dislike them. People refuse to look at or listen to or taste our works. Sure, critics are often wrong. But not always. Here are 4 questions to...
by Zoe M. McCarthy | Mar 14, 2013 | Leading
“The public as a whole is composed of various groups, whose cry to us writers is: ‘Comfort me.’ ‘Amuse me.’ ‘Touch me.’ ‘Make me dream.’ ‘Make me laugh.’ ‘Make me shudder.’ ‘Make me weep.’ ‘Make me think.’” —Guy de Maupassant We work on a painting, presentation,...
by Zoe M. McCarthy | Feb 7, 2013 | Creating
“Creativity takes planning in multiple iterations.” —Beth Comstock We have an idea for an activity or a writing project. We capture the idea and move to the next idea in our project. Then we wonder why the audience didn’t engage during our presentation. Why editors...