I have a problem: I’ve already read Lonesome Dove. And Lonesome Dove is the most totally absorbing wonderfully awesome novel on the planet. So nothing else really compares. Hence, my problem. I’ve tried to address this problem by waiting a lot of years and then reading Lonesome Dove again. I first read it in fourth grade, when I…
“I prefer to dream that the polished surfaces feign and promise infinity . . .” —Jorge Luis Borges, “The Library of Babel” You walk through the front doors of a building that resembles more a contemporary art museum than a repository of books. Instead of a librarian at a front desk, and rows and rows…
Lately I’ve been thinking about beginnings, endings, and that terribly murky time between a writer completing one project and starting another. After recently finishing a memoir, I’ve been itching to write a novel. I have a strong start to a new one—it’s always thrilling to be at the beginning of something, when all you see are possibilities instead of…
In our Writing Lessons series, writing students will discuss lessons learned, epiphanies about craft, and the challenges of studying writing. This week, we hear from Sahar Mustafah, a second-year MFA candidate and Follett Graduate Scholar in Fiction Writing at Columbia College Chicago. —Andrew Ladd, Blog Editor I was going to write the next Great American…
I’ve spent the last year and a half brushing up on reading that for the last three decades or so I’ve been neglecting. Since my daughter was born, I’ve been diving deep into the literary canon, paging through tens or hundreds (well, some days it feels like hundreds) of picture books. And while my voice…
So, we’ve talked about the beginning, the end, pluck, resiliency, and life—and yet here we are, still, wading through the slush pile. How many licks does it take to get to the center of a Tootsie Roll Pop? The world may never know, and how to have a reader pass on your work feels just as…
In our Roundups segment, we’re looking back at all the great posts since the blog started in 2009. We explore posts from our archives as well as other top literary magazines and websites, centered on a certain theme to help you jump-start your week. If Grease has taught us anything, it’s that summer is the…
Despite sometimes-embarrassing attempts at guitar, drums, and bass in my youth, I’m no musician. But if I’m honest, some of the best things I’ve written lately have not been stories or novel chapters, but songs. These are all a capella, all very short, and all written with a very specific audience in mind: my ten…
It’s a digital age, but we’re still mad for paper! Even as readers embrace the connectivity and convenience offered by iPads and Kindles, there are still many good reasons to celebrate a book’s physicality. In Ploughshares’ Book Arts series, we’ll be looking at some of the artists, curators, and craftspeople who work to keep things…
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