Poetry: The Bitterest Day
In his poem “Winter Walk,” nineteenth-century English poet John Clare meditates on both the wonders and the woes of observing nature during a brisk wintertime walk. He writes, “A single feather of the driving storm; / And in the bitterest day that ever blew / The walk will find some places still and warm / Where dead leaves rustle sweet and give alarm / To little birds that flirt and start away.” Throughout the fourteen lines of the poem, Clare weaves in bits of end rhyme to build momentum, using diction that highlights contrasting motion and weight, such as the sharp movements of “keenly blows” and “sudden falling snows” alongside the slowness of “creep between” and “scarce let through.” Take a stroll in cold weather and write a short poem that commemorates the pains and pleasures you encounter on your walk. Where “dead leaves rustle,” can you find beauty?
Fiction: A Convergence
The announcement of the Beatles breaking up, a teenager’s unexpected pregnancy, and the cryptic arrival of an unwelcome brother fill the first pages of Colombian author Evelio Rosero’s novel House of Fury, translated from the Spanish by Victor Meadowcroft and forthcoming in February from New Directions. It is a rapid introduction to a flurry of occurrences, all happening on the day of an anniversary party thrown by Señora Alma Santacruz and her husband, Nacho Caicedo, a Supreme Court magistrate, at their Bogotá mansion, where they live with their six daughters. Unfurling on a single evening in April 1970, the story erupts when guests from all walks of life arrive at the party, along with the chaos of a kidnapping, the presence of military troops, and multiple earthquakes. Write a short story that takes place over the course of a single evening and begins with a mix of surprising events. What happens at the climax of this convergence of characters and circumstances?
Nonfiction: Me and You
“As my relationship with my husband was breaking down, Mii was in the middle of it all with me, innocently unaware of what was on my mind,” writes Mayumi Inaba in her memoir Mornings Without Mii, translated from the Japanese by Ginny Tapley Takemori and forthcoming in February from FSG Originals, about her relationship with her cat Mii, who becomes a reliable source of solace and inspiration. After rescuing Mii as an abandoned newborn kitten, Inaba chronicles the two-decade bond between the pair, which sustained her through her writing life, her marriage, and the upheaval of adulthood. “When I was sleeping next to Mii, I had the feeling that I too had become a cat,” writes Inaba. Think about a relationship with a person, pet, object, or place that provided you with comfort and companionship. Write a memoiristic piece that traces the thread of this relationship through the years. How has this relationship remained a constant during tumultuous times?
Suggested Reading
Women in Independent Publishing: A History of Unsung Innovators, 1953–1989 (University of New Mexico Press, December 2024), edited by Stephanie Anderson
This collection of interviews with women actively engaged in small press publishing in the latter half of the twentieth century contains invaluable insights into a variety of approaches to independent publishing as well as illuminating histories of literary movements of the era. Readers hear directly from editors and publishers including Hettie Jones on Yugen, a journal that brought together the Beats, the Black Mountain poets, and the New York School poets of the late 1950s; Rosmarie Waldrop on Burning Deck Press, which published titles by Mei-mei Berssenbrugge, Lyn Hejinian, Marjorie Welish, and many others between 1961 and 2017; Alice Notley on the nine issues of Chicago magazine published between 1972 and 1974; Patricia Spears Jones on WB, Ordinary Women, and the Heresies Collective; C. D. Wright on Lost Roads Press; and Lee Ann Brown on Tender Buttons Press.
