This morning I sat down at my desk, read for a while, and then asked myself the same questions I’ve been asking for the past 15 years: what can this writer teach me? What does s/he do especially well that I can study? How would I write this differently? What I haven’t often thought of... Continue Reading →
Art is Your Right
Don’t buy into the romantic assumption that being a creative artist is easy for those who are truly talented and meant to do it. This is a materialistic commercial lie. Something I believe: art is part of being human and must therefore be available to everyone. And those who do it right never find it... Continue Reading →
By an Inner Sky I Chart My Way
The structure of what I write is the structure of my emotional life. My fiction isn’t autobiographical in any overt way. Yet how I approach my subject matter depends on the way I see the world and myself in it. Therefore, conceptually, perceptually, structurally, I write the narrative of my life the way I write... Continue Reading →
The Year of the Bastard: A True Life Story from the MFA Underground
1. Bad Juju My eyes were opened and I understood. “I can tell you one thing,” said Louie, taking a drag on his cigarette and leaning back in his chair, “he steps over the line again and we’ll have words.” “You won’t do anything of the sort. Don’t be ridiculous,” said Burt. “I’ll kill the... Continue Reading →
The Writing Expedition 