Mary Pickford: The First and the Best

Anyone researching and writing the life of Mary Pickford, as I am, can't help but be struck by the number of FIRSTS she accomplished:

She is called the first star of American cinema,
the First Lady of the movies.
She was the first actress to make $1 million and
the first actor to have her name on a theatre marquee.
Mary was the first female movie star to fly in a plane in a movie,
the first female star to head her own independent movie company, and the first actor to achieve international fame and recognition among millions in the world.
She was truly the world's first Super Star.

So much about Mary's film career is mentioned in SUPERLATIVES:
She was the highest paid woman in the world in her time, making more money than the US president.

 She was the most powerful woman in the history of motion pictures,
the biggest box-office draw in the world, and the most famous woman in the world in her time.

She was the most popular and financially successful woman in screen history.

I hope you'll enjoy meeting her in Mary Pickford: Canada's Silent Siren, America's Sweetheart.

Watch for it in September!

Joyful Writing

I want to write with joy and abandon. I want to write purely for the love of it, the way much of Growing Up Ivy was written.

I don't want to care if what I write is ever published, or if the right people find it worth reviewing. I want to write to satisfy something inside me, and I call that JOY.

The business end of writing can be miserable. Everyone knows it's not for the the easily-discouraged. But it is also competitive and can destroy optimism. There are aspects of the business that bring out the worst in me.

 Be gone, I say! Who wants to be mean-spirited? Life's too short for that.


Write on, with joy and abandon!