A Literary Slush Pile

One of my gigs this summer is reading the slush pile for an independent literary press. Although I’ve done a lot of slush pile reading in the past, what’s different about this experience is that the writing is not geared toward genre or convention, and I doubt any of the writers expect to sell millions … Continue reading »

Adult Literacy Programs

Every winter quarter, the seniors and writing faculty give readings of their most recent opuses* to the general public at Northwestern. This past Tuesday was the inaugural event, and, along with several wonderful student readings, Brian Bouldrey was the faculty reader. In the past, faculty members have read excerpts from published novels, essays, and poetry collections. … Continue reading »

Writing for Other Writers

In the October issue of Writer’s Digest, there is an article on an MFA program that teaches genre fiction as well as literary fiction. It is written by a professor of the program, and in it he makes a point that I think is very true; he says that somewhere in the birth of the … Continue reading »

Entertainment versus Serious Fiction

In my “Art of Fiction” class, we begin with a student presentation on an element of fiction and then proceed to workshops. Yesterday, the presentation was on plot. In the handout, the presenters made a distinction between an “entertainment story” and a “serious story”, saying that the former was genre stories and mass-trade paperbacks and … Continue reading »