Where We Write: Iowa
Iowa isn’t just the Writers’ Workshop. A native Iowan talks about how she learned to capture the true nature of her home state, and the stoic people who live there, in her writing.
Tags: craft
The Written Image: Jennifer Collier
UK artist Jennifer Collier uses repurposed books and papers to sculpt an array of art objects inspired by the very materials used to create them—from stilettos made from the pages of Little Women to gloves fashioned from the illustrated text of Alice in Wonderland—each finished project a reflection of the written words from which it’s made.
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The Art of Reading Per Petterson: Finding Appalachia in a Norwegian Novel
Even in translation, Norwegian author Per Petterson’s prose is intensely rhythmic and lyrical, evoking something akin to the oral tradition of Appalachian storytelling.
The Art of Reading John Berryman: Waking Up in The Dream Songs
A personal and in-depth look at the life and poetry of John Berryman, with particular focus on The Dream Songs.
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Muradov's Accidental Inspiration
“My work is a lifelong celebration of futility.” Artist Roman Muradov, designer of this issue’s cover, discusses his various wells of inspiration, his relationship to the written word, and the importance of doing nothing.
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The Written Image: Sorted Books
In her Sorted Books project, Nina Katchadourian arranges books from libraries—including William S. Burroughs’s personal collection, as well as those housed in museums and galleries across the country, to find a kind of poetry in the spines.
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Ethnicity and Craft: Creating Characters, not Caricatures
A writer and editor shares her thoughts, as well as lessons learned from authors such as Junot Díaz, Jhumpa Lahiri, and Celeste Ng, on writing of and from a culture that may be foreign to the reader: what do we explain, italicize, or translate? How do we navigate the divide between the ethnicity of a writer or character and that of her audience?
Feckless Pondering: Emotional Beats and the Art of Repose
A case for balancing action with introspection in fiction, in order to avoid “gumming up the gears of your story.”
Art Vs. Life: A Quarrel Between David Shields and Caleb Powell
What comes first—the human or the writer? David Shields and Caleb Powell discuss the origins and collaborative process behind the four-day argument about life and art that became their new book (and film), I Think You’re Totally Wrong: A Quarrel.
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