Artists' Fellowship - 2008
Fiction
Artist Statement:
The book I am working on at present, a novella and stories, has to do with marriage, how it is managed by the young and by the old, by those still married, and those bereaved. I am particularly drawn to depicting the loss of innocence in marriage and the surprise of middle-age. Most of the stories in the two previous collections, NIGHTWORK and A DAY, A NIGHT, ANOTHER DAY, SUMMER, concern relationships between mothers and sons, mothers and daughters, daughters and fathers; stories that touch on relationships between men and women, most often depict crippled and abusive experience. My first novel, FLORIDA, is an orphan’s novel although it might also be described as an apprenticeship novel. ALL SOULS, my second novel and most recent publication, is quite different in subject matter and tone. This book is about community as it is experienced in a New York City private all-girls’ school. My ambition for all of the fiction has been to write originally; the musicality of sentences is paramount; discovering new and effective narrative strategies is also important; finally, I aspire to write without agenda and in the dark and so be surprised by what appears on the page.
More about the Artist:
Author of two collections of short stories, NIGHTWORK and A DAY, A NIGHT, ANOTHER DAY, SUMMER, and two novels, FLORIDA, which was a National Book Award Finalist, and ALL SOULS, recently published in April of this year. Recepient of two O.Henry Short Story Prizes and a Pushcart Prize for fiction. Teach half of every year at the Nightingale-Bamford School, a private all-girls institution in New York City. Last year was the Louis D. Rubin Writer in Residence at Hollins University in Roanoke, Virginia; the previous spring (2007) a writer-in-residence at U.C. Irvine MFA program. Have taught in the MFA programs at Columbia University, Sarah Lawrence, and Bennington, as well as undergraduate writing program at Barnard College. Live in New York City with husband and cats. Have two grown sons.
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