I want to share some thoughts on what I read this summer, just so you know what writers do with all that spare time they have. At the end of this essay I also report on some of the stuff I have been working on.
This was my first summer being an empty nest writer. For the record, half of what writers do is read each other’s work. That’s probably why the job seems so great every once in a while.
My goodness, there is so much brilliant literature coming out these days — particularly by women. Beginning in July, I stumbled into all sorts of work by Renata Adler, Joy Williams, Cesar Aira, Shirley Jackson, Elena Ferrante, Mat Johnson, Lucia Berlin, Roxane Gay, and Clarice Lispector (she who barks at God, see photo above). All of these folks are pushing language and literature forward. We worry, right?, about the notion that fiction is coming to rest on the surface of the toilet waters of the world. Not so. You just have to keep looking for them that knows how to float around the room. They’re out there. I was smitten in particular with Aira, Lispector, and Renata Adler.
I just found a short Huffington Post ditty attached to a video rant by media phenom John Green sort of seeming to trash the idea of self-publishing and going it alone as an author. The link to it is: