Stories are like relationships: the beginning is always so much fun, and the ending is fraught with turmoil. When I sit down to start a story, the first sentence just sort of comes to me. The second sentence too. If I’m lucky, the third swiftly follows. The inimitable short story writer Kate Braverman once told a …
GalleyCat brought my attention to this terrific photograph by Pete Souza on Newsweek’s Tumblr. It’s a photograph of President Obama editing his Inaugural Address. I love the way the President’s hand is positioned on the page, as if he’s moving text around. I think this is a really fascinating glimpse into the way his mind works. …
Despite her knowledge of Greek and her voracious reading of the classics, Virginia Woolf considered herself a self-taught reader. As a woman, she had been denied the illustrious Oxford education that the men in her family enjoyed. As it turns out, her lack of affectation, her insistence on taking pleasure in reading, is what makes her …
This week, Yuvi Zalkow interviewed Thaisa Frank for The Rumpus. They met at the bar of the Hotel Rex, where Frank, author most recently of Enchantment, talked about where stories come from, among other things. I’ve long admired Frank, beginning with her story collection A Brief History of Camouflage, have often taught her work in …