My sister’s been globetrotting this year and posting a lot of excellent photos here.
Writing first drafts is painful, but I love revising. For the past few weeks, I’ve been editing my book by hand, which is my favorite part of the process. At this stage I’m looking at my work with critical detachment, catching awkward sentences and oft-repeated words. I scribble notes in the margins (examples: “when did she put out her cigarette?” and “add more sensory detail here” and “what does the nightgown look like?”). I feel most myself with a pen in my hand. And I always have coffee within reach.
I’m with Maile Meloy. “Nine Stories” is my favorite Salinger. This is the book that made me start writing short stories.
For the first post in a series where we ask New Yorker writers what book they have revisited most often, Maile Meloy writes on J.D. Salinger’s, “Nine Stories”: http://nyr.kr/Lb0Yza
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The Moon Window at the National Cathedral in Washington. There’s a piece of moon rock embedded in the stained glass.
Last night I saw the exquisite “Patience (After Sebald)”, a documentary that is essentially a close reading of The Rings of Saturn—one of my favorite books.
Marcel the Shell with Shoes On. A short film that never fails to make me laugh.
Last week, Mad Men’s Pete Campbell put his commute to good use by reading Pynchon’s The Crying of Lot 49. (Matthew Weiner made sure to use the jacket from the first edition.)
Wonder what he’s reading this week?