Morse Peckham, a professor under whom I took a class in graduate school, had a theory that the role of the arts in a complex, stressful society is to provide discontinuity, so that people might rehearse the experience of it…
More on the Senses by David Massey
I want to say a few more words about the senses in literature. So much can be accomplished through visceral detail. Consider the first paragraph of Anton Chekhov’s “The Beauties”: I remember, when I was a high-school boy in the…
On Method by David Massey
I read a statement by an author recently that if one does not follow a regular regimen of daily composition, one is not a serious writer. This was a fairly vain statement, it seemed to me, because it relegates the…
On Style by David Massey
Katherine Anne Porter said as true a thing as there is to say about style: “You do not create a style. You work, and develop yourself; your style is an emanation from your own being.” When I began writing seriously,…
Leaning on the Senses by David Massey
The senses are all we have. Without them we would be only a blob of protoplasm without even a sense of touch, and therefore with no ability to survive. Fiction is much the same. The fiction writer who best deploys…
How to Write a Sugar-Soaked Story by Noelle Sterne
Taking a break from writing, I flip the television channels and my eyes and remote land at a bright-screen, an urban setting with upbeat music, slick high-rises, and smartly dressed people hurrying about. A respite from the moody brown tones…
The Train Whistle by Nancy Scott
It always startles me. I always feel its vibrating, out-of-place call. Usually, I hear it just before or during rain or snow. I have heard it off and on for the 13 years I’ve lived in this apartment. I never…
Building a Writing Life out of Hard Work, Passion, and a Dash of Involvement by Heather Humphrey
Most of the writers I know keep some sort of motivational support handy: a clever phrase written on a post-it note, a poster of a beloved writer, a highly dog-eared copy of “Bird by Bird,” the photograph of a stern…
Turning My Screenplay into the Novel “Creature Storms” by Ron Clinton Smith
Movies are based on novels usually, but why shouldn’t it be the other way around? As an actor/writer I’d poured over other people’s scripts for years. I’d written stories and unfinished novels, and knew it was time to write this screenplay I’d been…
Choose a Strategy or Make It Up by David Massey
I want to say a few words about point of view and narrative strategy in fiction, starting with Henry James, from whom I learned so much when I first began trying to teach myself a little about the art of…
Seats at the Table by A’rikka Dion
I remember the day that I decided I wanted to be a writer. I was ten and, although I had long been labeled as “the girl with the books,” it had never occurred to me that I could create my…
The First Draft is for You (Dummy) by Nikki Macahon
I have no shame with sharing the first draft of anything I write, and that’s a problem, because sharing too early destroyed the first draft of my most recent novel. Context: A couple of months ago I finished out my…