Category Archives: letters from away
Fanboy
Over at the Morning News, my new essay “Fanboy” is up. The artwork here is a beautiful illustration commissioned from an artist by the name of Katie Turner. This is an essay that began about a year ago in a comic … Continue reading
Filed under author's own, Koreanish, letters from away, politics, travel
Not Too Soon
Hi, how are you? It’s late here, very dark. It’s the kind of moment that when you blog makes you feel as if no one will ever read it, so you could write anything and it wouldn’t matter, but of … Continue reading
Filed under apocalypse, letters from away, letters to you
Shark’s Teeth
1. The 2010 ‘Best of’ lists appear, like little angels of death. Little cuts on my will to get to the end of the year. Not now, I say, each time one appears. Not yet. I need to make use … Continue reading
Filed under author's own, fiction, go team, letters from away, novels, what I am working on, writers, writing
I Married Adventure
I sometimes have the urge in seaside towns to just take an apartment, go upstairs and rent it and close the door and write. This place is a little as if I’ve done that. I am in Florida on Manasota … Continue reading
Filed under author's own, letters from away
Go Ahead
[photo via Gothamist] 1. On the train down to New York Thursday, in the seats across from me, a 26-year-old American soccer player who works on an organic farm and a 30-something Turkish artist talk to each other for most … Continue reading
Filed under books, letters from away, media
“Consider Writing an 86 Proof Sentence.” – Charles Baxter
1. Saturday, I drive to Vermont with my friend Tayari, to Bread Loaf. The mosquitoes are terrifying. At a cocktail reception, as we take turns outside spraying ourselves, Sigrid Nunez advances a theory that this is because the bats are … Continue reading
Filed under letters from away, media, novels, political art, politics, what is right with us, writers, writing
Yes, Like That
I wake up in Jayne Anne Phillips’ house in Glen Ridge after the longest night of sleep I’ve had in a while—10 hours. Waking up here for me is a little like I imagine it might be for someone else … Continue reading
Filed under fiction, letters from away, MFA programs, what I am working on, writers, writing
Home Again
On the plane to Paris, I read articles about a new show coming to HBO, called Americatown. It imagines a future when Chinatown-style American ghettoes have sprung up all over the world, as Americans leave, looking for greater opportunity elsewhere. … Continue reading
Filed under letters from away, letters to you, Uncategorized
The Ring
Perhaps, because I have just been thinking about turning my savings into jewelry I can wear, this happens. At the Southeast corner of the Louvre, on the Rue de Rivoli, a woman bends over near me as I cross the … Continue reading
Filed under letters from away
In Which I Go To Paris
I go to Paris. The day I leave, I go to the bank to make sure I can take out the money for the rent due on the apartment where I’ll stay, in the 1st. The woman teller is wild-eyed … Continue reading
