From the Archives: Unlike the memoirist, who promises to tell the truth, the fiction writer says, “I am going to tell you a lie, but at the end you will feel it is true.” He or she is a kind of magician who makes sure you know the flames are only an illusion before letting you burn your fingers.
Entering a piece of writing in a collaborative way is at the heart of what Fowles called the “I-thou” theory: no matter how many times a book is read, it is fundamentally a relationship—an encounter—between just two people.
From the Archives: “If I came into writing feeling largely without history or place, writing became a means of discovering both; it also became, as it did for George Willard, a means of discovering a way out, the road ahead. Sherwood Anderson gave me a map.”
From the Archives: What does our reading have to do with our writing, exactly? Charlotte Boulay departs from traditional talk about fiction, reflects on her own reading list, and finds comfort and enthusiasm in reading Elizabeth Bishop and Robert Lowell’s letters to each other, in which they discuss everything they read—and the fact that they read all the time.
From the Archives: Why do we love Sherlock Holmes? The famed detective nearly sent his creator off the deep end, and has been the object of countless films, odes, debates, letters, and pilgrimages over the past century.
From the Archives: By astutely balancing the physical with the psychological, Elizabeth Graver manages to produce what Jacob M. Appel calls “four-dimensional stories.”
From the Archives: Peter Turchi on the art of disclosure from the 2010 AWP Panel “What to Say and When to Say It: Disclosure of Information for Optimal Effect in Fiction.”
From the Archives: In 1990, Stephanie Vaughn published her debut collection of short fiction, Sweet Talk. Critical reception was overwhelmingly positive. A reviewer for Mother Jones Magazine wrote, “There is not a weak story in Sweet Talk and few are less than spectacular … Hers is a wise, touching, extraordinary voice—the sort rarely achieved at the end of a gifted career, let alone at the beginning.” To date, Vaughn’s first book has also been the only one her adoring fans have seen.
From the Archives: Jennifer Solheim reveals how language structure impacts emotional resonance in the narrative—and for the reader.
Countless writers aspire to contribute something lasting to literature. We labor over drafts. We seek innovative forms. We push ourselves to evoke particularities in tone, plot, character, circumstance, and word choice. Yet in these various pursuits, we might overlook what also endures: literary references.
