Using everyday objects most of us take for granted--from forks and Velcro to safety pins and doorknobs--noted cognitive psychologist Robert Weber takes a fascinating look at how our world of inventions came into being, and how the mind's problem-solving abilities gave them the forms they have...
Learn MoreRobert J. Weber
Doctor, Author, Poet, Professor, Public Speaker, Photographer
About Robert J. Weber
Robert J. Weber received a doctorate in psychology from Princeton University. He has professed in New York, Ohio, Oklahoma, Oregon, Massachusetts, and New Mexico. His last position was as a Visiting Research Professor of Law at the University of New Mexico. His hobbies and evocations include photo editing to remove the stress fractures of reality—and writing to explore imagination’s reach.
He has presented workshops on Translating Film Techniques into Poetry. And advocated for writing and verse as performance art. These works and activities formed the basis for his seminars on invention and creativity.
Books:
Forks, Photographs, and Hot Air Balloons: A Field Guide to Inventive Thinking. Oxford University Press. A look into key inventions and how the mind influenced them.
Inventive Minds: Creativity in Technology. (Edited with D. N. Perkins). Oxford University Press. An exploration of the roots of ingenuity.
The Created Self: Reinventing Body, Persona, and Spirit. W. W. Norton. Pulling ideas from inventing and translating them to personal improvement and creation of the self.
Poems from the Rainbow’s Bow. Mercury Heartlink. Selected as the Poetry Book of the Year by the Cambridge, Massachusetts Book Club (2023). A poetry anothology full of deep ideas and history.
Swimming in an Ocean of Words. Buster Bodhi Press. A discussion on creative writing and thinking. Coming soon!
He has presented workshops on Translating Film Techniques into Poetry. And advocated for writing and verse as performance art. These works and activities formed the basis for his seminars on invention and creativity.
Books:
Forks, Photographs, and Hot Air Balloons: A Field Guide to Inventive Thinking. Oxford University Press. A look into key inventions and how the mind influenced them.
Inventive Minds: Creativity in Technology. (Edited with D. N. Perkins). Oxford University Press. An exploration of the roots of ingenuity.
The Created Self: Reinventing Body, Persona, and Spirit. W. W. Norton. Pulling ideas from inventing and translating them to personal improvement and creation of the self.
Poems from the Rainbow’s Bow. Mercury Heartlink. Selected as the Poetry Book of the Year by the Cambridge, Massachusetts Book Club (2023). A poetry anothology full of deep ideas and history.
Swimming in an Ocean of Words. Buster Bodhi Press. A discussion on creative writing and thinking. Coming soon!
Robert J. Weber Books
Is invention really "99 percent" perspiration and "one percent inspiration" as Thomas Edison assured us? Inventive Minds assembles a group of authors well equipped to address this question...
Learn MoreThe Created Self takes readers to as-yet-unexplored regions in the modern psyche’s preoccupation with self-invention... Using the insights of William James and evolutionary psychology as a springboard, Robert Weber explores the nature and meaning of our shifting selves...
Learn MoreCome to see imagination untamed and running loose in the wild, beautiful, tragic forests of the human heart and mind. Poems from the Rainbow's Bow offers compelling and provocative openings for a poetry book club discussion, or for any gathering...
Learn MoreSwimming in an Ocean of Words
Swimming in an Ocean of Words is both a new entertainment and a writer’s guide. In the old times of Blind Homer and The Iliad and The Odyssey – before writing – verse-poetry was a performance art. Overtime it migrated to primarily the printed page. I want to retrace that path and move in new ways from the printed page back to the performer’s stage, and to add to performance by creating more audience participation.
Blind Homer was not shy and would have welcomed his audience into his poems.
Blind Homer was not shy and would have welcomed his audience into his poems.
Testimonials
John Roche
Author of Tubbable: Poems of John Roche, Emeritus Associate Professor of English Rochester Institute of Technology
Author of Tubbable: Poems of John Roche, Emeritus Associate Professor of English Rochester Institute of Technology
Here is an intrepid voyage through the “ocean of language,” penned by a noted authority on the psychology of creativity. As he says, Imagination creates recipes from “word-fish” found in the ocean waters of memory and experience and language. You will find many surprises and discoveries along this journey.
Jo M. Solet,
Harvard Medical School, Division of Sleep Medicine Cambridge Health Alliance
Harvard Medical School, Division of Sleep Medicine Cambridge Health Alliance
Through his latest book, Swimming in an Ocean of Words, author Robert J. Weber serves as guide on our joint voyage, crossing boundaries of sensation. imagination, invention and translation to embody the creative process. He is our captain and shipmate as we welcome his challenge to translate what we sense, witness and wish for into words. This book is the most recent of his gifts of inspiration to his readers.
Barbara P. Blumenfeld
Professor Emerita, Legal Writing, University of New Mexico School of Law
Professor Emerita, Legal Writing, University of New Mexico School of Law
Robert Weber’s mind knows how to get outside the box and see life and all it contains in new and creative ways. This book is his gift of sharing some of his insights with other creative writers. The author begins with an innovative approach to creative writing and thinking, then shares his own inventive work as demonstrations of how one can use the tools he discusses in their own inspired endeavors. He includes specific and very thoughtful prompts, and yet, beyond that, the book in its entirety is a prompt that will take creative writers in new and imaginative directions. A wonderful starting point for a creative writing course or workshop.
Excerpt From The Book
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Projects and Engagements
Speaking Engagements
Robert Weber performing his poetry at Chatter Sunday, music and poetry venue. Contact for speaking engagements below.
Videos
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Videos - Copy
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Excerpt from the poem Lazy Day
