9.23.2015

STL : MEM : ATX

This is a few weeks overdue, but I (semi-)recently took a road trip from Chicago to Austin with my girlfriend. Along the way, we made a few stops, of various lengths, in various cities, for various reasons.

I didn't want to write a series of posts about how great Austin is or the freedom of being on the road and away from work. You already know these things. Austin is just as great as everyone says it is. I'd love to go back. At the same time, it's not quite correct to say this was a vacation. I had too much on my mind to call it a vacation. The trip was thought-provoking in ways I did and did not expect.

At nearly 17 hours of driving, it'd be damn near impossible, and unnecessarily exhausting to reach Austin from Chicago in a day. We decided to rent a room in Memphis, TN for a night; folks in Memphis seemed used to the fact that many visitors were "just passing through." Along the way we stopped in Springfield, IL for gas, coffee, and to take a selfie in front of the Capitol building; we stopped in St. Louis, MO, for a more important reason.

We stopped in St. Louis, MO because I wanted to go to a bookstore. 

9.15.2015

On Writing, On Fiction

Here are a couple quotes I saw recently about writing and what makes fiction work.

The first is from Lauren Groff, the editor of the most recent edition of Ploughshares (which I wrote a bit about here already). She rehashes the age-old idea of the lonely, pain-filled writer, with a bit of twist in her words.
"Writers are perennially lonely, and a writer's longing to connect is what fills her work with urgency." 
Key words: longing, connect, urgency. Of course, the other side of the debate, and one I struggle with, is how much importance do I place on making a "connection?" Isn't it more about just getting the story out there that I believe needs to be told, and to express myself in the artful medium I chose (or chose me if you want to get all whimsical about it)? You can read more about Groff and her writing process on Ploughshares ("She writes early drafts by hand, on legal pads. Once she has a complete draft of a novel, she throws the pages away, and begins again, writing the new draft (again by hand) from memory.").

9.14.2015

Literary Chicago: Ploughshares Summer 2015

Ploughshares, the collection of fiction and poetry put out three times a year by Emerson College (of which Denis Leary is a council member of the non-profit publication), was capaciously endowed with scenes from a Literary Chicago. Four stories mentioned this city, and at least three of the authors in the collection have called Chicago home at one point or another (Osama Alomar, Jesse Ball, Rebecca Makkai, and Alex Shakar). One story mentioning Chicago in a collection isn't particularly noticeable, but seeing the name of this city in four out of eighteen stories called for some attention, even if just a coincidence. Here's how a few contemporary writers fictionalized Chicago:

"That fall, she was starting graduate school at the Art Institute of Chicago. "Chicago," I said later that night, after our date. We were in bed; we'd just had sex. "You know, I've been a Cubs fan since I could stand on first base.""
"Later, we joked that the only reason I came to Chicago was because she needed someone to carry her paintings."
- Kevin A Gonzalez, Palau

"My racial color code as established by the Chicago Bank of Life is white...When I am donating to the Chicago Bank of Life, I do not think of her." 
- Fiona Maazel, Dad's Just a Number