College writers are desperate creatures, yearning for attention and audience. Hungry for praise, popularity, and even infamy, we all seek that fix—the sweet glory of publication—to validate those hours upon days upon weeks spent with head bent in humble supplication to whatever god may grace us from within the void of the blank, white page. … Continue reading Essay: Are you there, “The New Yorker”? It’s me, every hopeful college writer.
On Brevity, in Writing
Teachers always told me to write like Hemingway. With that lesson in mind, I feel the need to preface what follows: I apologize for, amongst other things, my long-windedness, loquacious garrulousness, bombastic verbosity, rambling blabbiness, general predisposition towards being voluble, and distaste of the laconic and brusque. Chiefly, I apologize for possessing a thesaurus. One eleventh … Continue reading On Brevity, in Writing
Artwork: Whose woods these are I think I know…
While it’s easy to forget stories, their details, characters, and perhaps even the imagery so painstakingly created for the page, it’s unnervingly difficult to forget the impression it leaves upon you. Cold, slippery, and often creeping into your thoughts long after the story itself has been filed away and stored in memory, old emotions from … Continue reading Artwork: Whose woods these are I think I know…
Postcards from an Offbeat Paradise
Driving town to town, I see little beauties and tiny facets that make and break the area: people, attractions, personality. It’s a nebulous idea and an easy ability being able to characterize an entire populace with a brief generalization in good accuracy, especially since road trips don’t offer much time and experience in three or … Continue reading Postcards from an Offbeat Paradise
Short Story: Coffee Shop Curator
There are a lot of trees in New York City. No, I don't mean Central Park—of course there are trees in the park. I mean it's like someone looked around at this dark grey place and thought, "Hey, why don't we just plant a bunch of shit so that when they try to say New … Continue reading Short Story: Coffee Shop Curator
On the Intellectual Merits of Genre Fiction
We all know genre fiction. Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter are the most well-known examples, but most any fantasy (Eragon, A Song of Ice and Fire) or science fiction (Ender’s Game, Dune) counts. These kinds of stories, while many are popular, are rarely if ever touted in academia, and often lack credibility in … Continue reading On the Intellectual Merits of Genre Fiction
Literature as the Adversary
When I tell people that Lolita is my favorite novel, I usually receive a reaction straddling the line between fascination and horror. Yes, I know what it’s about. It wouldn’t be my favorite book if I hadn’t read it too many times to count. Yes, I think it’s disturbing. It’s deeply disturbing in a way … Continue reading Literature as the Adversary
