Name: Barbara Sofer
First clue you wanted to be a writer; summarize the situation:
I can remember writing stories to read to my classmates on recess when I was in second or third grades. My father would type them out for me. Maybe it was even first grade because after that I could have written them myself.
Earliest remembered writing and publishing experience: When I was in eighth grade I won a watch in a national essay contest advertised on the back of Scholastic Magazine: Why do you want to go to college? I lived in a small town and winning the prize got a lot of publicity. The same year I sent submissions to the junior-senior high literary magazine and they were all accepted.
What part of your education helped you most on your path to writing? I think that my eighth grade English teacher who had an old-fashioned Catholic education and still believed in poetry and diagramming sentences gave me a sense of how language worked. As an adult, I took two important courses: a semester of non-fiction at the New School in NY, and fiction-writing at the Harvard University extension in MA. By then, I had to get my whole family—husband and five kids—to Boston for the year. I'd recommend that young people go after this training when they don't have that kind of mega challenge!
Who influenced you most along your way and how? The editor in the Hartford Courant who bought a series for me when I was a teenager; my best friend writer Sarah Wernick (www.sarahwernick.com) with whom I have exchanged ideas for 25 years, my writing teacher and friend Pam Painter.
Most satisfying piece(s) you’ve ever written----its audience: The most satisfying work is my novel—almost like having a baby—and the collected columns I write for the Jerusalem Post. These hundred articles form an opus of my thinking.
Your publications or venues for writing: I've written everything from speeches, scripts, newspaper and magazine articles, fiction and non-fiction books.
Nuggets of advice for young writers in middle school and high school: Read good writing, and don't be afraid of re-writing. Keep a notebook of good ideas. Don't let the critics discourage you.
