We Have Always Lived in the Castle

Enchanted Prose: Lyrical Language as Strength in the Mythic Novel

Enchanted Prose: Lyrical Language as Strength in the Mythic Novel

Mythopoeia, the making of myth, is primarily considered a genre reserved for writers of high fantasy (Tolkien coined the term). But to restrict mythopoeia to fantasy alone—to think of mythopoeia as a genre rather than a technique—is a disadvantage to realist writers, who then miss out on the advantages of mythic writing. Not only does…

Ways of Beginning

Ways of Beginning

New Year’s Eve has always struck me as sort of a strained holiday. The newness it represents feels invisible to me, no matter the countdowns and music and noisemakers piled on it—a threshold in the air, a line that’s there because we say it is. I’m always so aware of being my same old self,…

“Death!/ Plop.”: The Instructive Power of Very Bad Art
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“Death!/ Plop.”: The Instructive Power of Very Bad Art

In the basement of three small theaters in Massachusetts lives a collection of some of humankind’s worst artistic efforts: the Museum of Bad Art. Everything in the collection is gloriously, earnestly bad (the curators reject anything that seems bad by intention). You can go there. You should. The photograph above is just a first taste….