Welcome to Wednesday Writing Essentials.
Today is November 26th, the day before Thanksgiving (US).
In honor of this holiday, Wednesday Writing Essentials will feature good articles about any of the following:
Thanksgiving (US, Canada) - I know Canadian Thanksgiving was in October, but now is a good opportunity to publish another article.
Harvest Festivals - ancient or modern. Even Oktoberfest is a Harvest Festival. So is Thanksgiving, for that matter.
Holidays from your country or culture of origin that focus on Food and Family, another theme that Thanksgiving has in common with many other holidays around the world.
* * *
And now, a look at some Harvest Festivals in the ancient world.
The word "harvest" is from the Anglo-Saxon word "haerfest", which meant Autumn, and generally referred to the Autumn season of gathering grain.
As the Harvest Moon is the Full Moon closest to the Autumnal Equinox, many Harvest Festivals in pagan times were celebrated under a Harvest Full Moon, the Full Moon that falls in September.
Another early Harvest Festival was celebrated on August 1, and was called "Lammas", which meant "loaf mass." During this festival, farmers made loaves of bread from the newly ready wheat crop, which were given to the church for Communion.
In 1843, Reverand Robert Hawker in Britain, invited parishioners to a special service at his church in Cornwall. Hymns popular during this time included "All things bright and beautiful" and "We plough the fields and scatter", which helped spread the message that the harvest time was a good time to be thankful and to celebrate.
Church bells rung on each day of the harvest and a corn doll was made from the last sheaf of corn to be harvested. The horse that brought the last load of grain to be harvested was decorated with garlands of flowers andribbons. The Harvest Festival ended with a grand feast at the farmer's house, with games also being played to celebrate the end of the harvest and the beginning of a bounty of grain.
Did you know? Harvest Festivals are celebrated in these countries:
Africa, Australia, Bali, Barbados, Britain, Canada, China, Czech Republic, France, Germany, Greece, Indian, Ireland, Japan, Korea, Lithuania, Mexico, Native American Harvest Festivals, The Nederlands, Poland, Portugal, Roman, Scottish, Swaziland, Swedish, Taiwan, Vietnam, Zambia.
From Greco-Roman mythology, we have the stories of Persephone/Proserpina- as Harvest stories often help explain the seasons, with journeys to the underworld or to the North ice countries.
So, bring it on!
Previous Wednesday's Writing Essentials, author bio/lit reviews:
Wednesday Writing Essentials: Using Your Senses - Pavarotti Lives on in Paul Potts
Wednesday Writing Essentials: Flannery O'Connor Lives On
Dostoevksy/Raskolnikov: Guilty, Guilty Guilty
Harper Lee
Anne Sexton
Tennessee Williams' Kowalski's Stellaaa
Sylvia Plath
Melville's Bartleby the Scrivener
JD Salinger's Catcher in the Rye
Faulkner
* * *
To learn more about Gather's Writing Essential channel, please view these articles:
Writing Essentials by Pam Johnston VP Community Engagement
Meet the Writing Editors by Pam Johnston
Official Description of Writing Essentials by Jennifer Hodge, Gather Editorial Team
To join Writing Essentials, click HERE
* * *
About Kathryn
Kathryn Esplin Oleski kathryneo.gather.com
Kathryn Esplin-Oleski was raised in Salt Lake City, but moved to Montreal with her family, where she finished high school and college. Kathryn has a BA in English Literature from McGill University and a Master of Science in Journalism (MSJ) from the Medill School of Journalism, at Northwestern University, in Evanston, Ill.
Kathryn's articles have appeared in The Montreal Gazette, The Globe and Mail, and Kathryn covered Utah politics at Medill from Washington, D.C. for The Ogden Standard-Examiner. She has also written on business, computers, health, living, education, arts, travel and books.
She freelanced for numerous computer/business publications, including a stringer story for Newsweek magazine on graft in the music industry.
Kathryn worked as a news/feature reporter, and Features Editor for International Data Group (IDG) for several years, and then continued to writing freelance computer/business articles.
Kathryn copyedited a technical book, Raggett on HTML 4.0, Second Edition, published by Addison-Wesley Longman, New York and London, 1998.
Kathryn's fiction, The Quill Speaks, was published in Pieceworks, in 2003.
Kathryn was a finalist in the Gather-Borders-Mitch Albom contest:"Times My Mom Stood Up for Me:" My Mom Stood Up for Me During the Last Days of My Childhood.
Copyright © 2007, 2008 Kathryn Esplin-Oleski.
recommend this
email
print
link to this page
Comments: 41
BTW you and Selene make it three good-looking birds. LOL
<>BCOMMENTED.COM
The group is very slow today. So far. I expect it will pick up. Busy day with people working, going to the grocery.....
We live in an age where harvest means hopping into the car and driving to the supermarket. Bounty is what we stuff into the back of the SUV.
Harvest Festivals tie us to the annual cycles of our ancestors; to an age when a year's worth of labor was gathered from the fields in the fall. It is good to reflect on that....to look on the world through slower cycles.
India has more than one harvest festival, can you believe that! And each with its own mythology, associated food and family traditions to boot! Amazing diversity in this ancient land. In order to post something both meaningful, informative and in-depth, though, I'd have to research the festival I choose to write about, and in my present circumstances, that would mean a week, at least - my time is no more my own.
If something relates to the current theme, but doesn't make it by the deadline for that theme (assuming you do have theme deadlines), may one still post it as a general-interest article?
I apologise from my heart for responding so very late to your gruppen invite ...but I don't believe in being a mere lurker contributing nothing, merely feeding off what others submit.
This harvest festival theme really unlocked some deep urge in me to join your beautiful group and contribute to it in my own humble way! Thank you for the invite, and even more for starting such an intriguing, meaningful and educative group for writing!
As it was with you, I felt a warm, beautiful bond with the entire group instantly. I'm not surprised, for all our efforts - whether creative/artistic, or even in the more routine/mundane activities of daily life - are infused with the fragrance of our soul - and you have one of the most beautiful souls I've ever embraced in my forty-plus years through life!
((((((((((((((Wondrous Wordsmith Kathryn!)))))))))))))
As many as you would like.
I would love, love to receive them, dear friend.
You are so sweet!
Dear Kathryn, thanks for the lightning parry to my lingering thrust hehehehe The nearness of the deadline is enticing, makes me shiver, but also disappointing - I won't be able to make it. Maybe I'll embrace another one, another time - but I do promise articles on Indian harvest festivals will eventually wend their languorous way into your group's flowing Word-Bins!
The harvest here is rich and alluring - I'll have to dig diligently for...the woods are lovely, dark and deep...just like a woman! Thank you so much for your most recent (Gather) email, I was left writhing in ecstasy ( I swear!) and all thoughts left me. That's called meditation, right? So maybe you should start your own school of meditation - we could call it the Scribbler's Dance Meditation or something...?!!! Eh?
AND . your story, oh God! What can I say that others wouldn't already have told you , and much more expressively!! I think I'll save my reply for the other mail - I 'll be a little more composed by then, like a well-structured sonata, non? :))
Wish you warmth, wisdom, wealth and ... wondrous words, words, words forever, for you're no mere writer of words, you're a chanteuse with them! They're truly "songs of life... they ring from quiet steeples... into people's hearts!", to make Diamond turn in his grave once again....
((((((((((((Charmer Chanteuse Kathryn!)))))))))))))))))
Thanksgiving is great but who are we really thanking? It is a puzzle that I have not yet unfolded and would love to some day. I think that Thanksgiving is a holiday where we get mad and frustrated with family that drive us nuts. So this year ban the nuts and let us just serve turkey
Spicecomments.com - Flowers Comments
Much love to you all! (((((((((( Kathryn's Waltzing Wednesday Writers!))))))))))
It's a rather unusual Thanksgiving tale. But, I know you will like it!
Sixthdrabble