Will Self paraded his verbal skills with a reading at NTU on Saturday which proved that there is some content behind the bravado, solipism, debauchery and sheer profligacy. Looking at SELF’s career it hard to find an entry point such is the sheer weight of verbiage trundled ad nauseum across every promotional page available. The…
creative writing M.A.
Daily Short: Mark Strand – Dog life.
A strange one this and no mistake. Mark Strand who had arisen as poet in Sarah Jackson’s lecture is now discovered lurking in Shapard and Thomas’s 1986 anthology of the then recently termed,’Sudden fiction’ which now typically called ‘Flash Fiction’. The anthology I picked up in 1989 when fairly obsessed with post BASS* 1986 American…
Daily Short: Joy Williams – Dimmer
Joy Williams – Dimmer introduced by Daniel Alarcon from Object Lessons: The Paris Review presents the short story (Heinemann 2012) http://www.theparisreview.org/interviews/6303/the-art-of-fiction-no-223-joy-williams This is the hardest Daily Short story so far. Not only have I never read Joy Williams before I also had no idea of her background so the interview above, which is excellent, has…
Overheard: The Anthology – Oral Literature?
http://www.saltpublishing.com/shop/proddetail.php?prod=9781907773266 Yesterday we were treated to a fine reading from selected authors in Jonathan Taylor’s 2013 anthology ‘Overheard’ as part of the Nottingham Festival of Words. David Belbin, Claire Baldwin and editor Jonathan taylor himself read their stories and there was a brief discussion afterwards where Jonathan’s comments tallied nicely with neglected English Short Story…
Daily Short: John Romano – King of the Wild Frontier
Available online here: http://www.vice.com/en_uk/read/king-of-the-wild-frontier-0000346-v21n6 I recently picked up the Fiction issue of Vice magazine. http://www.vice.com/magazine/21/6 Recommend these annual issues all of which are available online. They have a tendency to lean toward the Lad/Ladette market but contain some interesting works. Especially from the film/fiction crossover area. This year’s issue also contains Nabokov’s unpublished Lolita screenplay and…
My Book Grid: 1975- present
Interesting exercise came out of class last night. Hard to recall some of this and I genuinely cannot remember reading anything but web design manuals and music magazines for at least five years at NTU…scary.. Feel like Rumpelstiltskin.
Poetry: A bad day in the comfort zone?
There have been three Monday lectures on the course and two of them have been by poets and in addition a first Poetry tutorial session with Rory Waterman ( I have since requested changing to part-time so that will be last Poetry session until next year). I have had a hefty poetic boot up the arse…
Daily Short: Lionel Shriver – Kilifi Creek
This review has been revised. I felt it was too easy to criticise a writer on one piece of work with no ‘back-story’. I have done that and for me it didn’t get any better in fact…. Lionel Shriver – Killifi Creek I have now re-read the original short story and I have flicked through…
Daily Short: Bernard MacLaverty – A Foreign Dignitary
In ‘Friendship: 12 masterpieces of short fiction’ for John McCarthy, Ryan Publishing Co. Ltd; First Edition edition (1990) Also collected in: “A Foreign Dignitary,in Best Short Stories 1989, edited by GilesGordon and David Hughes. 1989; as The Best English Short Stories 1989, 1989. Walking the Dog and Other Stories. 1994. A tricky one this. I have…
Daily Short: Ron Hansen- Playland – 1989
I had the idea of reading at least one short story a day. It sort of working and I have managed three so far this week. The first on Tuesday was Ron Hansen’s ‘Funland’ from ‘Nebraska’ a collection of short stories published in 1989. I purchased it at the time because of the cover which…