You and Yours
Write a story using second-person narration. For an example of the use of second-person narration, read the opening lines of Jay McInerney's novel Bright Lights, Big City.
Genre: Fiction
Man Asian Literary Prize Announces Long List
The Hong Kong-based Man Asian Literary Prize recently announced the long list for its 2012 prize. The international award is given annually for a novel by an Asian writer, written in or translated into English and published during the previous year. The winner, who will be announced in March, will receive $30,000.
The list includes Goat Days (Penguin Books India) by Benyamin of India; Between Clay and Dust (Aleph) by Musharraf Ali Farooqi of Pakistan; Another Country (Fourth Estate) by Anjali Joseph of India; The Briefcase (Counterpoint Press) by Hiromi Kawakami of Japan;Thinner Than Skin (HarperCollins Canada) by Uzma Aslam Khan of Pakistan; Ru (Clerkenwell Press) by Kim Thúy of Vietnam and Canada; Black Flower (Houghton Mifflin Harcourt) by Young-Ha Kim of South Korea; Island of a Thousand Mirrors (Perera Hussein) by Nayomi Munaweera of Sri Lanka; Silent House (Knopf) by Orhan Pamuk of Turkey; Honour (Viking) by Elif Shafak of Turkey; Northern Girls (Penguin China) by Sheng Keyi of China; The Garden of Evening Mists (Myrmidon Books) by Tan Twan Eng of Malaysia; The Road To Urbino (Abacus) by Roma Tearne of Sri Lanka and the United Kingdom; Narcopolis (Faber and Faber) by Jeet Thayil of India; and The Bathing Women (Blue Door) by Tie Ning of China.
Thúy and Tearne were eligible this year under the Prize’s new rule regarding writers who have lost their Asian nationality through state action.
In a press release, David Parker, executive director of the prize, said: “This list testifies to the strength and variety of new writing coming out of a culturally emergent Asia. It is full of stories the world hasn’t heard before and which the world needs to hear. It brings together seven books in English translation, which means that, as well as introducing exciting debut novelists, the Prize is also bringing to international attention some best-selling and important writers who are little known outside their own language communities.”
The chair of judges, international journalist and cultural critic Maya Jaggi, is joined by Vietnamese American novelist Monique Truong and award-winning Indian novelist Vikram Chandra.
The fifteen long-listed candidates will be narrowed down to a shortlist on January 9, and the winner will be announced on March 14 at a celebratory dinner in Hong Kong.
Established in 2007, the Man Asian Literary Prize is sponsored by the Man Group, which also oversees the Man Booker Prize for British literature and the Man Booker International Prize. The 2011 winner of the Asian Literary Prize was South Korean writer Kyung-sook Shin for her novel Please Look After Mom (Knopf). She was the first woman and first South Korean writer to win the prize.
Visit the Man Asian Literary Prize website for more information and submission guidelines, and to find out more about the long-listed novelists.
In the video below, watch the longlist announcement from David Parker and a Q&A with Maya Jaggi.
John Gardner
Caption:
The author of the novels Grendel, October Light, and The Sunlight Dialogues as well as legendary books such as On Becoming a Novelist and The Art of Fiction, had a tremendous influence as a creative writing teacher. Watch Gardner's children discuss their father's rigorous teaching style and his devotion to the craft of fiction—then see the man in action in this clip from Open Road Media.
Genre:
God, I Love Writers!
Caption:
Here's a pleasant daydream in the form of an animated New Yorker cartoon by Charles Barsotti.
Genre:
Cream City Review Contest Open for Submission
The Milwaukee, Wisconsin-based literary magazine cream city review is currently accepting submissions for its annual poetry and fiction contest. Winners in each genre receive a $1,000 prize and publication in the Spring 2013 issue. The deadline for entry is December 31.
Poets and fiction writers may submit three to five poems or up to twenty pages of fiction, along with a $15 entry fee, which includes a copy of the contest issue, to cream city review, Department of English, University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, P.O. Box 413, Milwaukee, WI 53201. Submissions must be typed, double-spaced (poetry may be single-spaced), and should include the author’s name and address. Winners will be announced on the cream city review website in the spring. The magazine’s annual nonfiction contest has been discontinued.
Founded in 1975 by Mary Zane Allen, cream city review is a volunteer-operated, non-profit literary magazine published twice yearly, in the spring and fall, by the University of Wisconsin in Milwaukee. Boasting an international readership, the magazine is “devoted to publishing memorable and energetic pieces that push the boundaries of literature” and seeks to “explore the relationship between form and content.” The magazine publishes poetry, fiction, creative nonfiction, comics, book reviews, literary criticism, author interviews, and original artwork. Approximately four thousand submissions are received each year from emerging and established writers. Past contributors have included Aimee Bender, Charles Bukowski, Robert Olen Butler, Amy Clampitt, Billy Collins, Tess Gallagher, Joy Harjo, Bob Hicok, Allison Joseph, Audre Lorde, Ben Percy, Adrienne Rich, and Alberto Ríos.
The journal’s name pays homage to Milwaukee, whose moniker “The Cream City” refers to Cream City brick, a light-yellow-colored brick made from clay native to the city, which was first produced in the early nineteenth century. For more information about cream city review and for complete submission guidelines, visit the website.
Flash Fiction
Write a work of flash fiction, a story that contains the classic elements—a main character who faces a conflict that is resolved—but one that is only three hundred to one thousand words in length. For guidance, read David Gaffney’s advice in the Guardian or visit the literary magazine Flash Fiction Online.
The Secret Sharer
Caption:
Listen to this 1985 recording of Orson Welles reading “The Secret Sharer," a story by Joseph Conrad. “I think I’m made for Conrad,” Welles once said. “I think every Conrad story is a movie.”
Genre:
A Country Doctor
Caption:
Check out award-winning Japanese animator Koji Yamamura's adaptation of Franz Kafka's tale "A Country Doctor," written in Prague during the winter of 1916.
Genre:
Susan Straight
Caption:
The author of ten books, including the novel Between Heaven and Here (McSweeney's, 2012), delivered this talk on telling stories at an independently organized TED event in Redondo Beach, California, back in October.
Genre:
Rewriting a Myth
Write a story that is a retelling of a classic myth set in contemporary times. How do the characters change? What is the effect of a contemporary setting? Does the story end the same way? For inspiration, read Anne Carson's Autobiography of Red.
Pages
