October 8, 2019 Redux Redux: The Deep Well of Other Beings By The Paris Review Every week, the editors of The Paris Review lift the paywall on a selection of interviews, stories, poems, and more from the magazine’s archive. You can have these unlocked pieces delivered straight to your inbox every Sunday by signing up for the Redux newsletter. This week at The Paris Review, we’re listening to Season 1 of The Paris Review Podcast in anticipation for Season 2. We’ve unlocked archival selections used in Season 1: the Art of Fiction with Maya Angelou, the short story “A Dark and Winding Road” by Ottessa Moshfegh, and Pablo Neruda’s poem “Emerging.” If you enjoy these free interviews, stories, and poems, why not subscribe to The Paris Review and read the entire archive? You’ll also get four new issues of the quarterly delivered straight to your door. And make sure to listen to the new trailer for The Paris Review Podcast—Season 2 premieres October 23! Maya Angelou, The Art of Fiction No. 119 Issue no. 116 (Fall 1990) Podcast Season 1, Episode 1: “Times of Cloud” I know when it’s the best I can do. It may not be the best there is. Another writer may do it much better. But I know when it’s the best I can do. I know that one of the great arts that the writer develops is the art of saying, “No. No, I’m finished. Bye.” And leaving it alone. I will not write it into the ground. I will not write the life out of it. I won’t do that. Read More
October 1, 2019 Redux Redux: Courting Sleep By The Paris Review Every week, the editors of The Paris Review lift the paywall on a selection of interviews, stories, poems, and more from the magazine’s archive. You can have these unlocked pieces delivered straight to your inbox every Sunday by signing up for the Redux newsletter. Cynthia Ozick. This week at The Paris Review, we can’t sleep—our theme is insomnia. Read on for Cynthia Ozick’s Art of Fiction interview, Georges Perec’s short story “Between Sleep and Waking,” and Susan Barbour’s poem “Insomnia.” If you enjoy these free interviews, stories, and poems, why not subscribe to The Paris Review and read the entire archive? You’ll also get four new issues of the quarterly delivered straight to your door. And make sure to listen to the new trailer for The Paris Review Podcast—Season 2 premieres October 23! Cynthia Ozick, The Art of Fiction No. 95 Issue no. 102 (Spring 1987) INTERVIEWER You write all night. Have you always done so? OZICK [Speaking, not yet typing.] Always. I’ve written in daylight, too, but mainly I go through the night. INTERVIEWER How does this affect your interaction with the rest of society? OZICK It’s terrible. Most social life begins in the evening, when I’m just starting. So when I do go out at night, it means I lose a whole day’s work. Read More
September 24, 2019 Redux Redux: Gold-Leaf from the Trees By The Paris Review Every week, the editors of The Paris Review lift the paywall on a selection of interviews, stories, poems, and more from the magazine’s archive. You can have these unlocked pieces delivered straight to your inbox every Sunday by signing up for the Redux newsletter. Ali Smith, with Leo, in Cambridge, 2003. This week at The Paris Review, we’re in an autumnal mood. Read on for Ali Smith’s Art of Fiction interview, the second part of Katharine Kilalea’s novel in serial OK, Mr. Field, and Jane Hirshfield’s poem “Autumn.” If you enjoy these free interviews, stories, and poems, why not subscribe to The Paris Review and read the entire archive? You’ll also get four new issues of the quarterly delivered straight to your door. Ali Smith, The Art of Fiction No. 236 Issue no. 221 (Summer 2017) INTERVIEWER Were you pleased to see Autumn referred to as “the first serious Brexit novel”? SMITH Indifferent. What’s the point of art, of any art, if it doesn’t let us see with a little bit of objectivity where we are? All the way through this book I’ve used the step-back motion, which I’ve borrowed from Dickens—the way that famous first paragraph of A Tale of Two Cities creates space by being its own opposite—to allow readers the space we need to see what space we’re in. Read More
September 17, 2019 Redux Redux: Lies That Have Hardened By The Paris Review Every week, the editors of The Paris Review lift the paywall on a selection of interviews, stories, poems, and more from the magazine’s archive. You can have these unlocked pieces delivered straight to your inbox every Sunday by signing up for the Redux newsletter. This week at The Paris Review, we’re thinking about duplicity, about scam artists and liars, about cheating in all forms. Read on for Nathaniel Rich’s 2006 interview with Laura Albert, the woman behind the JT LeRoy hoax; Uzodinma Iweala’s short story “Speak No Evil”; and Alan Davies’s poem “Lies.” If you enjoy these free interviews, stories, and poems, why not subscribe to The Paris Review and read the entire archive? You’ll also get four new issues of the quarterly delivered straight to your door. Being JT LeRoy By Nathaniel Rich Issue no. 178 (Fall 2006) INTERVIEWER When you were writing, did you feel JT take over in the same way as when you were talking? Did you feel that JT was writing? ALBERT No, when I wrote I felt more like it was me trying to craft a story. He’d tell the story and I was the secretary who would take it down and say, OK, thank you, now I’m going to try to turn it into craft. But while I wouldn’t sit there and think of myself as JT, as long as I was writing I didn’t have to be Laura either. Read More
September 10, 2019 Redux Redux: Volume and Color By The Paris Review Every week, the editors of The Paris Review lift the paywall on a selection of interviews, stories, poems, and more from the magazine’s archive. You can have these unlocked pieces delivered straight to your inbox every Sunday by signing up for the Redux newsletter. William Styron. This week at The Paris Review, we’re celebrating the release of our latest issue with selections from Fall 2019 contributors who have previously appeared in the magazine. Read on for William Styron’s 1999 Art of Fiction interview, Diane Williams’s short story “O Fortuna, Velut Luna,” and Kevin Prufer’s poem “The Adulterer.” If you enjoy these free interviews, stories, and poems, why not subscribe to The Paris Review and read the entire archive? You’ll also get four new issues of the quarterly delivered straight to your door. William Styron, The Art of Fiction No. 156 Issue no. 150 (Spring 1999) There have been certain scenes in all my works that came to me with such mysterious ease—with the sense of being preordained—that I can only attribute them to the same powerful subconscious process. Read More
September 3, 2019 Redux Redux: Tautology, Tautology By The Paris Review Every week, the editors of The Paris Review lift the paywall on a selection of interviews, stories, poems, and more from the magazine’s archive. You can have these unlocked pieces delivered straight to your inbox every Sunday by signing up for the Redux newsletter. This week at The Paris Review, we’re going back to school. Read on for Elizabeth Bishop’s Art of Poetry interview, Ottessa Moshfegh’s short story “Bettering Myself,” and Melanie Rehak’s poem “Self-Portrait as the Liberal Arts.” If you enjoy these free interviews, stories, and poems, why not subscribe to The Paris Review and read the entire archive? You’ll also get four new issues of the quarterly delivered straight to your door. Elizabeth Bishop, The Art of Poetry No. 27 Issue no. 80 (Summer 1981) The word creative drives me crazy. I don’t like to regard it as therapy … It’s true, children sometimes write wonderful things, paint wonderful pictures, but I think they should be discouraged. From everything I’ve read and heard, the number of students in English departments taking literature courses has been falling off enormously. But at the same time the number of people who want to get in the writing classes seems to get bigger and bigger. Read More