3 Tricks to the Third Person

One of the techniques I’m working on this year is writing in the third person. Because most of the literature I read as a kid was in first person, when I started writing, I started with first person, and I’ve never quite moved out of that mode. I’ve written a couple of short stories in … Continue reading »

3 Reasons to Imitate

The writing program at Northwestern University values as a learning tool the imitation. We read established authors like Chekhov, Carver, and Saunders (to name a few of the very long list) and then set out to imitate them. Now, this imitation can be very liberal–some of us use them merely to get the germ of … Continue reading »