GT Bulletin Craft Essays

Glimmer Train may be winding down, but its Bulletins with craft essays from writers continues a stongly as ever. The October 2018 installment features:

Writing Immigrant Stories by May-lee Chai [pictured]: “For American authors writing about a multicultural, globalized world, the issue of translation is unavoidable: what to put into English, what to leave in a mother tongue, and how to render the mixed-English that often is used in immigrant families.”

Novel and Story by William Luvaas: “For years, the novel was dominant, with its loud, broad-shouldered personality. Novel was so self-assured—something of a bully, really—while Story scurried about, mouse-like under the furniture, speaking in a whisper, fearing Novel would step on it. Then something unexpected happened.”

Tobias Wolff (from an interview by Travis Holland): “So when I would read a great story of Ray Carver’s, like ‘Errand’ or ‘Cathedral,’ my thought would be, ‘I want to write this well.’ Not write like him, because I knew I couldn’t. That was his world, his voice, all that.”

This and all previous bulletins are archived here.