July 26, 2019
On the Importance of the Authorial Voice
In his book The Art of Perspective, part of Graywolf Press’s series of craft books on writing (which I’ve written about a few times before on this blog), Christopher Castellani […]
November 29, 2018
In Defense of Walter Scott
In E.M. Forster’s Aspects of the Novel, a book made up of a series of lectures the author gave at Cambridge in 1927 and which I’ve discussed on this blog […]
October 25, 2018
E.M. Forster on Fantasy and Prophecy
There is a strange distinction made in the later chapters of E.M. Forster’s Aspects of the Novel, a collection of lectures the author gave at Cambridge in 1927. I’ve already […]
September 7, 2018
Are Characters Real People?
Last week, in discussing flat characters, I ended with an argument that’s perhaps mildly controversial—that characters are not real people but just words on a page, artificial creations of an […]
August 27, 2018
In Defense of Flat Characters
Every fiction writer who’s taken even an intro to creative writing class is likely aware of E.M. Forster’s famous distinction between flat and round characters, from his book of lectures […]
September 7, 2012
‘Were there but world enough and time’: Tom Phillips on A Humument
If the un-canon exists—or the alternative canon; a trove of works treasured outside of the mainstream—then it indisputably includes Tom Phillips and A Humument, his capstone project. A painter by […]