Spark: How Creativity Works
Written by Julie Burstein and Kurt Andersen
Narrated by Julie Burstein
3/5
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About this audiobook
How did Richard Ford's cat influence his work as a novelist? HOW is Chuck Close's portraiture driven by his inability to remember faces? What pivotal moment helped Rosanne Cash understand the healing power of the stage?
Creativity is an elusive subject. We enjoy its fruits—movies, novels, paintings, songs—but rarely are we privy to what happens in the creative process. In Spark, Julie Burstein traces the roots of some of the twenty-first century's most influential and creative thinkers, including Joyce Carol Oates, Yo-Yo Ma, David Milch, Isabel Allende, and Joshua Redman. Burstein pulls back the curtain to reveal the sources of these artists' inspiration and the processes that bring their work into being.
""These artists may not change lead into gold,"" Burstein writes, ""but they lift materials from their familiar contexts, combining, reshaping, transforming them into works of art that change the way we see the world."" Spark is an invaluable resource for the aspiring writer and artist, but the need for creativity extends well beyond the world of paintbrushes and typewriters. Creativity is integral to business, parenting, education, science, and, perhaps most poignantly, our personal relationships. Rarely do books on creativity illuminate and inspire; this marvelous volume will help you find a spark of your own.
Julie Burstein
Julie Burstein is a Peabody Award-winning radio producer and TED speaker. Julie designed Studio 360 with Kurt Andersen for Public Radio International, and led the creative team at WNYC for many years. She's the host of Pursuit of Spark, conversations about creative approaches to the possibilities, challenges, and pleasures of everyday life.
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Reviews for Spark
15 ratings1 review
- Rating: 3 out of 5 stars3/5Julie Burstein, producer of Studio 360, here puts to the page the creative lives of actors, painters, singers, musicians, filmmakers, poets, sculptors, writers & a landscape designer who have appeared on that public radio show. While many of their stories and comments are compelling (especially the ones where suffering and adversity factors on their creative output), the book is written in the 3rd person, so some of the immediacy is lost. Also, far too many of the artists went to Yale or Harvard or Princeton, or had parents who actively promoted their talent when they were children, or led privileged lives. So their methods for creative achievement aren't the full story. To put it more bluntly, where's the hope for a poor girl like me?