And so today I find another unadventurous fiction longlist from the National Book Awards: not a single book from an…
Big Other
What’s happening in this image? The leftmost light bulb is exploding. Why would it do that? Perhaps it wanted to?…
The Barthelme Problem
[This post is something of a response to John’s recent post, and some of the comments made there by Darby,…
We Know Best What’s Nearest (Living Art Backwards)
A quick follow-up to Tim’s post here, which was itself in response to Jackie Wang’s post here. Wang had asked:…
Style as Imitation
1. My father, who once trained as a baker, taught me when I was a kid how to bake an…
Wally Wood’s 22 Panels That Always Work!!
I recently acquired Kitchen Sink’s The Outer Space Spirit collection, two months’ worth of Spirit comic strips from 1952, written…
Uncover Your Tracks: A Preliminary Critique of James Wood’s How Fiction Works
Shya posted something two days ago about James Wood’s How Fiction Works, in which Wood advocates the use of “free…
Why Genre Will Prevail, in Peace and Freedom from Fear, and in True Health, through the Purity and Essence of Its Natural Fluids, God Bless You All
re: John M. recently quoting something that Paul wrote at his blog, and re: Roxane’s recent post and the resulting…