At Artforum, underground comics artist Aline Kominsky-Crumb discusses the relationship between story and art in her work. “My comics are more story-driven than art-driven: The art has to bow to the writing,” she says.”When you have to coordinate the images with the writing, it’s complicated. When I get sick of doing comics, I paint, because it’s direct. Comics people read books, and the art is sometimes secondary. Which is fine—that’s how we meant to do it! We didn’t mean for it to go on walls. But when I see people appreciate the art, and they’re looking at it in a different way, how can I complain?”
Aline Kaminsky-Crumb’s Art Bows to the Writing
The Craft of Jennifer Clement’s ‘Gun Love’
I am always interested in how language can bring beauty to ugliness and despair. Language can enlighten the divine within the profane.
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The Horror, The Horror: Rereading Yourself
Here is a secret about writers, or at least most writers I know, including me: we don’t like to read our published work.
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Edith Wharton Will Teach You Everything You Need to Know About Naming Characters
Her 1905 classic The House of Mirth offers a masterclass in the art of character naming, from heroine Lily Bart to the seriously laughable Mrs. Peniston.
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Craft Corner: The Millions Interviews Christopher Beha
"Setting out to write a "big" book feels like a very male—or maybe Mailer-ite—ambition, in the worst possible way."
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Writing Sideways: Edith Wharton, the Postmodernists, and Social Satire
Familiarity may breed contempt, but in fiction it is a productive contempt.
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