{"id":154696,"date":"2021-09-21T10:54:45","date_gmt":"2021-09-21T14:54:45","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=154696"},"modified":"2021-10-12T13:03:25","modified_gmt":"2021-10-12T17:03:25","slug":"redux-too-sweet-a-muddle","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/21\/redux-too-sweet-a-muddle\/","title":{"rendered":"Redux: Too Sweet a Muddle"},"content":{"rendered":"

Every week, the editors of\u00a0<\/em>The Paris Review\u00a0lift the paywall on a selection of interviews, stories, poems, and more from the magazine\u2019s archive. You can have these unlocked pieces delivered straight to your inbox every Sunday by\u00a0signing up for the Redux newsletter<\/a>.<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Ali Smith, with Leo, in Cambridge, 2003.<\/p><\/div>\n

This week at The Paris Review<\/em>, the leaves are changing, the air is cooling, and the autumn equinox approaches. Read on for Ali Smith\u2019s Art of Fiction interview<\/a>, Robert Walser\u2019s work of fiction \u201cFrom the Essays of Fritz Kocher<\/a>,\u201d and Reginald Shepherd\u2019s poem \u201cA Muse<\/a>.\u201d<\/p>\n

If you enjoy these free interviews, stories, and poems, why not subscribe<\/a> to The Paris Review<\/em>? You\u2019ll also get four new issues of the quarterly delivered straight to your door.<\/p>\n

Ali Smith, The Art of Fiction No. 236<\/a>
\nIssue no. 221 (Summer 2017)<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

INTERVIEWER<\/p>\n

Were you pleased to see Autumn <\/em>referred to as \u201cthe first serious Brexit novel\u201d?<\/p>\n

SMITH<\/p>\n

Indifferent. What\u2019s the point of art, of any art, if it doesn\u2019t let us see with a little bit of objectivity where we are? All the way through this book I\u2019ve used the step-back motion, which I\u2019ve borrowed from Dickens\u2014the way that famous first paragraph of A Tale of Two Cities<\/em> creates space by being its own opposite\u2014to allow readers the space we need to see what space we\u2019re in.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Autumn leaves of bramble courtesy of Wellcome Images via Wikimedia Commons.<\/p><\/div>\n

From the Essays of Fritz Kocher<\/a>
\nBy Robert Walser, translated by Damion Searls
\nIssue no. 205\u00a0(Summer 2013)<\/em><\/p>\n

\n

Colors fill up your mind too much with all sorts of muddled stuff. Colors are too sweet a muddle, nothing more. I love things in one color, monotonous things. Snow is such a monotonous song. Why shouldn\u2019t a color be able to make the same impression as singing? White is like a murmuring, whispering, praying. Fiery colors, like for instance autumn colors, are a shriek.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n

\"\"<\/a>

Autumn leaves and fruits of bramble courtesy of Wellcome Images via Wikimedia Commons.<\/p><\/div>\n

A Muse<\/a>
\nBy Reginald Shepherd
\nIssue no. 131 (Summer 1994)<\/em><\/p>\n

He\u2019s the friend that lightning makes, raking<\/p>\n

the naked tree, thunder that waits for weeks to arrive;
\nhe\u2019s the certainty of torrents in September, harvest time<\/p>\n

and power lines down for miles. He doesn\u2019t even know
\nhis name. In his body he\u2019s one with air, white as a sky<\/p>\n

rinsed with rain. It\u2019s cold there, it\u2019s hard to breathe,
\nand drowning is somewhere to be after a month of drought<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

 <\/p>\n

If you enjoyed the above, don\u2019t forget to\u00a0subscribe<\/a>! In addition to four print issues per year, you\u2019ll also receive complete digital access to our sixty-eight years\u2019 worth of archives.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Reading Ali Smith, Robert Walser, and Reginald Shepherd.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[31006],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-154696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-redux"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\nRedux: Too Sweet a Muddle by The Paris Review<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"September 21, 2021 \u2013 Reading Ali Smith, Robert Walser, and Reginald Shepherd.\" \/>\n<meta name=\"robots\" content=\"index, follow, max-snippet:-1, max-image-preview:large, max-video-preview:-1\" \/>\n<link rel=\"canonical\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2021\/09\/21\/redux-too-sweet-a-muddle\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"Redux: Too Sweet a 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