I might have met four Pulitzer Prize winning authors earlier than my Ushashi; however my daughter outpaced her Papa today when her name was written by Gene Weingarten at Georgetown campus. The humour columnist and writer has signed an autograph for Ushashi in his book the fiddler in the subway. Weingarten thanked me for helping out in penning Ushashi's name correctly on his book. The day-long workshop dedicated to writing excellence also took a test of my passion for meeting creative minds as it was a rainy and sluggish weekend, difficult for a comfort loving late rising holidaymaker. Thankfully the rains and uncertainty over finding a suitable parking in DC could not spoil my month long plan.
Alongside Weingarten other Pulitzer winning writers conducting the workshop were: Anne Hull, Eugene Robinson, Kathleen Parker, all from the Washington Post. The participants found Roy Peter Clark's session " Writing Tools: 50 Strategies for Every Writer" inspiring. Noted authors such as Thomas French and Diana Sugg-also Pulitzer winners- were in fact nurtured by him. I was lucky to have his autographed book "Help for Writers: 210 Solutions to the Problems Every Writer faces"[Long retired from newspaper writings, hope, I would be able to nurture myself through his masterpiece notwithstanding the disconnection from purpose]. " To Jabed, enjoy"-wrote the writing guru. His teaching on sentence construction from Shakespeare's Macbeth -how" The Queen, My Lord, is dead!" is the best sounding expression compared to all other alternatives-was truly educative.This bunch of great writers read out from their own works that the audience enjoyed in a pin drop silence.
Irrespective of whatever skill I have learnt from the workshop Write Your Heart Out, Washington or whether I would be able to apply that in my government service career, certainly I would cherish the day for their witty conversations and not least because one Pulitzer winner has written to my daughter.
