If you recognize the name "the Inklings," congratulation on being serious fantasy book-nerd -- and I mean that as a sincere compliment, I really do.
The original Inklings were an informal writing/literature studies group that met at Oxford University during the 1930s and 1940s. Its two most famous members were J.R.R. Tolkien and C.S. Lewis.
I'm not the first person to start a writing club and name it after the Inklings. I'm just the latest. I consider mine the "local chapter." This last school year, the club proved very popular. There were little over twenty members -- grades 3 through 6. Although, I later added a very talented second grader. She actually has three books for sale on Amazon, and I'm confident there will be more in the future. She is amazing!
So is her older brother. Over the course of six months, this kid wrote ten stories -- each one was over ten pages each. His stories are insanely creative and original. They're "juvenile." I mean, he is only eleven -- although very mature for his age. But I would have to say his stories are deliberately "juvenile" -- but not in a simple, crude or silly way. It's just the opposite. His stories possess intelligence, wit, and a sense of satire.
Another one of my Inklings, a young lady, has an amazing command of language and storytelling. It's like she absorbed, through osmosis, how to write. She was a sixth grader, like the boy I mentioned earlier, so that means I'll be losing them to junior high, but I've told them "Once an Inkling, always an Inkling," and that they can send me any new writing any time they want.
This club has been a blessing to me. It has been a joy getting to share my passion with talented newbies and help them develop that talent. But on a deeper level, it's an amazing feeling to be the type of mentor for these kids that I never had growing up -- and desperately wished I'd had.
In fact, that missing piece of my life growing up, is what inspired me to focus on gifted education.
More to come,
Take care,
Dan
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