Craft

Permission for Privacy

Because of Robinson’s vast permission to explore what she wills however she wills, she’s creating literature that ministers to a profound and very contemporary thirst—for grace, for beauty, for kindness. She teaches me that those hidden, peculiar, contrary motivations that rise up when I’m given solitude are even more worthy than I thought.

Giving Your Story a Plot

I can’t tell you how often I read early drafts of memoirs that are thorough, lively recordings of events, great for preserving family history but absolutely unsatisfying as memoirs.  First this happened, and then this, and then this… Even when the events are shocking, amazing, horrific, terrifying, or otherwise scintillating, the drafts read like flat …

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Language that Shows

When tweaking language during the final stages of revision, strive for clarity first. Language is meant to communicate. Sound, rhythm, pacing, word choice, sentence structure, punctuation, paragraphing—all stylistic choices—should convey the content rather than call attention to themselves. Take Strunk and White’s advice: “The beginner should approach style warily, realizing that it is an expression …

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