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A Certain Slant of Light, Winter Afternoons
Winter has its charms and compensations, yes, and a terrible abbreviated monochromatic beauty, but it’s also a challenge for certain light sensitive, shivery types, requiring ever-increasing degrees...
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More Than Just a Habit–The Letters of Flannery O’Connor
Cover via Amazon The recent attention and acclaim Flannery O’Connor’s previously unpublished “Prayer Journal” has received inspired me over the holidays to pull out my well-thumbed marked up copy of...
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Flannery O’Connor on Writing
Once one gets through the hesitancy and uncertainty of her youthful scholarship student ruminations at the Iowa’s Writers Workshop in THE HABIT OF BEING, the view broadens, the pace quickens and the...
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Fllannery O’Connor on “The Meaning of a Story”
From THE HABIT OF BEING: THE LETTERS OF FLANNERY O’CONNOR, P.437 [O'Connor was frequently aggravated and frustrated by mis-readings and misunderstandings of her work by people who she felt should know...
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Flannery O’Connor on Writing: You Are Always Bounded by What You Can Make Live …
Here are a few short ones (all I have time for right now, apologies) but they may keep a certain sort thinking, chewing on them, for a while in spite of their brevity– “The sense of place is very...
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WHERE DO GOOD STORIES COME FROM?
For non-writers, yet voracious readers, this has always been a question tantamount to asking where did the universe come from? The sources seem so mysterious, inexplicable and almost supernatural....
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BOOKS AS WIDGETS?
BOOKS AS WIDGETS? For the price of a sandwich? (A short excerpt fm an essay from the New Yorker) “Afterward, [after meeting Bezos] Doeren told his partner at Rainy Day Books, “I just met the world’s...
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“What Each of Us Is Seeking the Poet Already Knows”– Harvard Classics (now...
Poetry: A General Introduction. HARVARD CLASSICS The Harvard Classics have just now become available–for free– online. The nearly 60 books in this series are so well written, erudite, thoughtful and...
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“The grandmother did not want to go to Florida.” Flannery O’Connor’s Mastery...
Flannery O’Connor‘s desk and typewriter (c) Copyright 2014, Margaret Langstaff, All Rights Reserved. “The grandmother did not want to go to Florida” is the first line in O’Connor’s short story...
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Hot tip for aspiring writers today: Ploughshares Emerging Writers Contest
The prestigious literary magazine Ploughshares with a long distinguished history of discovering and publishing tomorrow’s literary greats, has announced this year’s “Emerging Writers Contest.” Go for...
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In Her Own Voice: Flannery O’Connor Reads Aloud A GOOD MAN IS HARD TO FIND
This recording will add tremendously to the reader’s understanding of this classic story. Straight from the horse’s mouth, a great author in her own voice tells the story in the way she wanted it to be...
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“Poetry: Who Needs It?” by William Logan in today’s NY Times
“The dirty secret of poetry is that it is loved by some, loathed by many, and bought by almost no one.”—William Logan ~.~ I know several readers of this humble blog (including its writer) are deeply...
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An Author’s Query for Info About Stanley Elkin and William Gass
This just in– I have been briefly corresponding with a researcher-scholar and novelist who is seeking sound information regarding the Elkin-Gass friendship, both personal and professional, to wit,...
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“Some Place” (is better than no place at all)
In the rural South, if you are a newbie in town, or just passing through, and pull into a truck stop or Mini-Mart, for however brief a time and however chintzy a purchase, you are sure to be asked a...
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“Twilight’s Indian Princess”– a new story
Now Available for Kindle on Amazon.com Sarah Sloan McCorkle of Piney Point, TN is a smart, hard-working schoolteacher, a good wife and great mother, who “married down”—according to her Southern...
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Writers & Reviews
Though many author friends of mine claim they “never look at reviews” of their books, assuming the transparently fake pose of pretending utter indifference and total superiority to what the mass of...
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Banville on Banville – A Great Contemporary Novelist Speaks Frankly
One of my favorite novelists interviewed by the PARIS REVIEW From THE PARIS REVIEW John Banville, The Art of Fiction No. 200 Paris Review Interview with British novelist John Banville EXCERPT...
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Like running on a tight-rope – Elizabeth Gilbert on Writing
[This is a shorty and to the point, interesting and worth considering. Elizabeth Gilbert is an accomplished writer, and offers here some controversial, though perhaps helpful, observations about...
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“And whence they come and wither they shall go/the dew upon their feet shall...
[ I referred/alluded to this essential Stevens poem, a poem that is really key to understanding the rest of his work, in my previous post. I felt I should post it here for your convenience and...
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Word Crimes –“The Movie” Cute, Clever!
Filed under: Humor, Literature, writing Tagged: blogging, grammar, usage, writing
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