In 1975, Annie Dillard won the Pulitzer Prize for General Non-fiction for her book Pilgrim at Tinker Creek (Amazon|Bookshop). A few years later, she wrote an essay in The New York Times with advice for writers and artists, calling on them to observe...
Alexander Chee’s essay in The Morning News about studying writing with Annie Dillard includes a memorable description of how it felt to get back papers that she’d marked up. This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “That...
In his collection of essays, A Temple of Texts, writer William Gass observed: “The true alchemists do not change lead into gold; they change the world into words.” This is part of a complete episode. Transcript of “The True...
In a powerful essay on white privilege, Good Black News editor Lori Lakin Hutcherson includes the term chandelier pain to describe how painful accumulated slights can be. Medical professionals use the term chandelier pain to refer to the result of...
Hey kid, hey kid, give ’em the saliva toss, the perspiration pellet, the damp fling, deluded dip, the good ol’ fashioned spitball! An essay on baseball slang from 1907 sent Martha off on a search for more of these wet ones. This is part...
Some call it quitting a book, while others call it post-publication editing. You know, in place of neglected pre-publication editing. John in San Diego, California, who suggested that term, said he believes many a book should have been an essay...
