Archives for October 11, 2016

From 2006:

I loathe biographers who nudge you in the ribs every few pages, sticking in pointed little reminders that the deeply suppressed sadomasochistic tendencies (or whatever) of Flannery O’Connor (or whoever) permeated her life and thought and insinuated their way into every page she wrote, blah blah blah. Who among us hasn’t thrown up his hands in despair at the prospect of reading another such book, especially when it’s nine hundred pages long? Repeat after me: show, don’t tell. Let the reader draw his own conclusions….

Read the whole thing here.

“Like many popular best-sellers, he was a very sad and solemn man who took himself too seriously and his art not seriously enough.”

V.S. Pritchett, “Rider Haggard: Still Riding”