“I would still like to know things. Never mind facts. Never mind theories, either,” the narrator states in Alice Munro’s short story “The Turkey Season.” The comment refers to a mysteriously heated altercation between coworkers that occurred decades ago, when the narrator was fourteen and spent the holiday season working as a turkey gutter. Although the details of the dramatic fight remain unknown and continue to haunt her, the bulk of the story rests on descriptions of mundane recollections: learning how to clean turkeys; coworkers’ personal lives and habits; issues surrounding labor and class as well as gender and sexual dynamics; and the expression of each person in a photograph of the work crew. Take inspiration from Munro’s story and write a short story with an ambiguity at its core and a narrator who looks back on a period of time during a holiday season. Use this larger theme of puzzling over something unresolved to explore the nuances of an uncertain time in adolescence when personal value systems are tentatively being formed.

The Oxford English Dictionary has announced the 2018 word of the year: “toxic.” Originating in the mid-seventeenth century from the medieval Latin toxicus, signifying “poisoned” or “imbued with poison,” the word has taken on new associations and collocates in the years since—workplace, masculinity, relationship, and Britney Spears, to name a few. This week, read through the list of definitions and origins for this timely term and write an ode incorporating as many of the variations as you can.

In a recent New York Times profile by Penelope Green, author Anne Lamott says, “I don’t write stuff I don’t think is universal, if I write about my butt or my body or my, you know, challenges with self-esteem or my raging ego, I know it’s universal.” Jot down a list of personality traits, idiosyncratic beliefs or opinions, or past situations that seem extremely specific to you alone. Upon deeper reflection, is there a possible overlap between any of these topics and circumstances others may be familiar with? Select one of these items and write a personal essay that extends this seemingly personal concern into the realm of the universal.

The winners of the 2018 National Book Awards were announced at a ceremony tonight in New York City. Sigrid Nunez took home the award in fiction for her novel The Friend (Riverhead Books), and Elizabeth Acevedo won the prize in young people’s literature for her novel, The Poet X (HarperTeen). Justin Phillip Reed won the prize in poetry for his debut collection, Indecency (Coffee House Press), and Jeffrey C. Stewart won the prize in nonfiction for his biography of Alain Locke, The New Negro: The Life of Alain Locke (Oxford University Press). This year the National Book Foundation also awarded a prize in translated literature to Yoko Tawada for her novel The Emissary (New Directions Publishing), translated from the Japanese by Margaret Mitsutani.

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The annual awards are given for the best books of poetry, fiction, nonfiction, young people's literature, and translated literature published in the previous year. The winners each receive $10,000.

Emceed by actor Nick Offerman, the ceremony celebrated the importance of literature and books. “In our inexorable pursuit of freedom and human rights, books serve us as weapons and shields,” he said. “They are perhaps the greatest creation of human kind, one that is living and ever growing.”

Earlier in the evening, writer Luís Alberto Urrea presented the Medal for Distinguished Contribution to American Letters to Isabel Allende, who has published more than twenty books, most recently the novel In the Midst of Winter (Atria Books, 2017). Allende, who is the first Spanish-language author to receive the award, spoke about what the award meant to her as a Chilean writer living in America. “I have always been a foreigner… This award means maybe I’m not alien anymore,” she said. “Maybe I can plant roots. Maybe I’m not going anywhere.”

Hidden Figures author Margot Lee Shetterly presented the Literarian Award for Outstanding Contribution the American Literary Community to Doron Weber of the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation for his work on the intersection of literature and science.

Established in 1950, the National Book Awards are among the largest literary prizes given in the United States. The 2017 winners were Frank Bidart in poetry, Jesmyn Ward in fiction, Masha Gessen in nonfiction, and Robin Benway in young people’s literature.

Photos (clockwise from top left): Sigrid Nunez, Elizabeth Acevedo, Justin Phillip Reed, Jeffrey C. Stewart, Yoko Tawada.

“Graffiti Palace was the amazing confluence of three worlds that crashed together: The Odyssey, graffiti, and the Watts riots,” writes A. G. Lombardo in “5 Over 50” in the November/December issue of Poets & Writers Magazine. Lombardo describes the circumstances in his life, such as his job as a high school English teacher, that combined to form “this strange brew of ideas” around which his debut novel revolves. Write a short story that combines several elements of your life, perhaps including hobbies or passions, political events of national importance, and favorite works of art or entertainment. How can you crash these disparate interests together to form a cohesive narrative arc? 

The headless chicken monster: the stuff of nightmares or a real scientific oddity? It’s actually the nickname for a deep-sea swimming cucumber recently captured on camera for the first time in the Southern Ocean between Australia and Antarctica, and caught on film only once before in the Gulf of Mexico. Write a poem inspired by this reddish-pink finned creature, taking inspiration from its scientific name Enypniastes eximia, and its other nicknames, such as the headless chicken fish, the Spanish dancer, and the swimming sea cucumber. Take a look at photos and videos to see this unusual creature’s bulbous, transparent body and webbed, veil-like appendages and tentacles moving across the ocean floor.

“Boredom becomes a seeking state. What you’re doing now is not satisfying. So you’re seeking, you’re engaged,” says psychologist Heather Lench in an article for Wired about the connection between boredom and creativity. Do you remember the last time you allowed yourself to truly do nothing to the point that you felt bored? Write a personal essay about a time when you had nothing to do and how that inspired you to create something. This could be a childhood memory of inventing a new reality or a more recent experience when you allowed yourself time away from distraction and wrote a new piece. Use this essay to reflect on how silence and inactivity have played a role in your creativity.