Chuck Palahniuk from Grub Street on Vimeo.

You can also listen to last year’s keynote address (in MP3 format) by Ann Patchett, acclaimed author of the novels Run, Bel Canto, The Magician’s Assistant, Taft, and The Patron Saint of Liars. In her speech she demystifies the writing process, focusing on the importance of discipline, what it takes to finish work, and why writer’s block is nonsense. She begins her frank and funny talk with these lines: “The muse is bullshit. I can not say it enough. Let it go. Forget about it. It’s not happening. This is a job.”

Midway through her speech, Patchett refers to the the TED (Technology, Entertainment, Design) lecture by dear friend and fellow writer Elizabeth Gilbert, author of Eat, Pray, Love and Committed, who approaches the creative process from the exact opposition position. In this talk, Gilbert examines the role of creativity and inspiration in a writer’s work. In particular, how our understanding of “genius” has shifted post-renaissance from being a separate entity that visited artists and influenced their work to actually residing within artists. In short, from “having genius” to “being a genius.”

1909 postcard of Boston Public Library

The Boston Public Library is now accepting applications for its Children’s Writer-in-Residence Fellowship, a little-known but wonderful opportunity for children’s and YA writers. The fellowship, offered to one writer per year, is intended to “provide an emerging children’s writer with the financial and administrative support needed to complete one literary work” and offers a workspace in the library and a $20,000 stipend.

Recipients’ projects may be fiction, nonfiction, poetry, illustration combined with any of the former, or a script; last year’s recipient, Kelly Hourihan, is working on a YA novel.

There is no application fee, and to apply, you must be a U.S. citizen with no more than three previously published works of children’s literature. The Boston Public Library’s webpage has more information about the fellowship and past recipients, as well as full application guidelines in PDF form. The next residency runs from September 1, 2010, to June 1, 2011, and the deadline for application is April 1, 2010.

photo from the Harvard Book Store website

Boston-area readers know Harvard Book Store as one of the best independent bookstores in the country. The store hosts author events and readings nearly every night, and the knowledgeable staff is always ready to help should you need a recommendation. Now, they’re encouraging writers as well. In honor of the shortest month, Harvard Book Store is running a short-short contest:

Let’s make these 28 days count! Write a short short story (500 words or less). Send us your entries (no more than 3 entries per person) by 5 p.m. on Wednesday, February 17th. We’ll read them, pick our favorites, and, at the end of the month, we’ll print them in a book, using our very own in-store print-on-demand machine, Paige M. Gutenborg!

Entries must be unpublished and written between February 1 and February 17. If your story is chosen, you’ll receive a copy of the yet-to-be-titled collection and will be invited to read their story at the bookstore on March 1. One grand-prize winner will also receive a $50 gift certificate.

Full details and rules are here. And if “Paige M. Gutenborg” caught your attention, check out store owner Jeff Mayersohn’s essay about why he invested in the book-making machine.

We’ve seen a lot of book adaptations lately, from Where the Wild Things Are to Precious to The Lovely Bones. Screenwriters and directors cut scenes here and add scenes there to transform the book into a cohesive viewing experience. A good adaptation can be a brand-new work of art. But in the process, the book is often boiled down to its essence while the particulars–the writer’s own words–are often lost.

The American Repertory Theater in Cambridge, Massachusetts, is trying to work around that. The A.R.T.’s latest production is “Gatz,” a staged reading of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby in which the original text is the show:

Gatz is conceived as a single six-hour production in which an ensemble of 13 actors bring to live every word of the novel with no text added and none removed.

The show begins as an office worker (played by actor Scott Shephard) finds a copy of The Great Gatsby and begins to read it aloud. An NPR review explains what happens next:

It doesn’t take long for things to turn strange. Co-workers wander on and off stage — an assistant, a janitor, a man in a suit. The lines between the narration and the action begin to blur. It’s as if the book is coming to life. Then, the janitor blurts out a line of dialogue from “Gatsby” character Tom Buchanan.

“Civilization’s going to pieces!”

And so it goes, ramping up, getting more surreal. While “Gatz” stays true to the words, it takes liberties with every prop, sound effect and stretch of the imagination.

The show is so long that it’s split into two parts, separated by a dinner break.

So why do it this way? Every novelist’s dream: a profound love for the novel itself, exactly as it’s written. “What made this a great book,” director John Collins explains in a video interview with NPR affiliate WBUR, “was not so much the story, or the characters, or the themes, or the symbols, but this writing. We thought, well, here’s a great crazy idea to start with, here’s a great crazy project, here’s a great impossible task: we’ll do every single word of it.”

Even the most slavishly faithful adaptations are based on plot and characters; usually, the only use of the actual text of the book is in dialogue, or (shudder) voiceover. Beautiful, powerful, pivotal passages of prose are condensed into a single shot, or left out entirely–never mind that the author probably spent weeks fine-tuning the language and picking just the right words. So as a fiction writer, I can see the appeal of the “Gatz” type of adaptation: the writing itself is in the spotlight the whole time.

What’s more, the show is intended to dramatize the blurring of the boundaries between reality and fiction. Collins continues, “When you read a book that you love… you start to see the people that you know in the characters. And you also start to see the book around you, when you get that involved. The line begins to blur a little bit between your own reality and the reality of the book.”

You can see the A.R.T.’s trailer here and snippets of the show here.

Orhan Pamuk / photo by Elena Seibert

Boston-area FWR readers, check out the Boston Book Festival THIS Saturday, October 24, 10:00 am to 6:00 pm at Copley Square. The festival features readings, lectures, and discussions such as:

• Keynote speaker Orhan Pamuk
• “Ties That Bind”: novelists Richard Russo, Michael Thomas, and Elinor Lipman on the family in fiction
• John Hodgman interviewed by Tom Perrotta
• “Book Worms and Net Crawlers”: thoughts on “the ubiquitous internet and the explosion of social media” by authors Ben Mezrich and Ethan Gilsdorf and New York Times technology columnist David Pogue. (Read the FWR review of Ethan’s book, Fantasy Freaks and Gaming Geeks, here.)
• “Struggles in a Strange Land: The Power of Place,” a panel discussion with Anita Diamant, Anita Shreve, Elizabeth Nunez and Carolina De Robertis
• Free writing classes from Grub Street, Boston’s premier independent writing center

Click here for a full list of events and descriptions. There will also be lots of exhibitors, like 826Boston and One Story Magazine, with giveaways and goodies.

Admission is free and the festival happens rain or shine.