{"id":58676,"date":"2013-08-29T12:00:36","date_gmt":"2013-08-29T16:00:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?p=58676"},"modified":"2013-08-29T12:00:36","modified_gmt":"2013-08-29T16:00:36","slug":"on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/","title":{"rendered":"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" class=\"aligncenter size-full wp-image-58593\" alt=\"SARAH_JOURNALlarge\" src=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg\" width=\"600\" height=\"748\" srcset=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg 600w, https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge-240x300.jpg 240w\" sizes=\"auto, (min-width: 62.5em) 67vw, 100vw\" \/><br \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p><em>Read <a href=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/28\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-one\/\" target=\"_blank\">part 1 here.<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n<p>People often ask me whether, as a writer, I prefer to write by hand or on a computer. Realistically, it depends on the kind of writing I\u2019m doing, but for a long time I responded that I preferred writing on a computer because it\u2019s more difficult to write by hand and because writing on a computer is faster. \u201cMy thoughts move faster than my hand,\u201d I would say, as if one part of my body was smarter than the other. Of course, this was just an excuse. The first entry of my latest notebook includes the following passage:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>How much time every day will I have to spend getting all of my thoughts down on paper? But they don\u2019t have to be <span style=\"text-decoration: underline;\">all<\/span> of my thoughts. But some may be left behind. Are they really that important? How important are my thoughts? That is the real question here.<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>The question of how much time every day is required for keeping a notebook is\u2014like the question of the difficulty of writing by hand, or that of whether or not someone will read my notebooks, or the question of accuracy or inaccuracy\u2014just a way to keep myself from making work that is \u201cunpresentable.\u201d I don\u2019t mean unfinished\u2014I mean <i>not good<\/i>. Over the last two years, I\u2019ve managed to scare myself out of treating my notebook as a private space, and trick myself into using it only as a place to reflect on other peoples\u2019 public thoughts under the guise of intellectualism. It is the same fear that beset me three and a half years ago when I took my high school notebooks outside and burned them. What was I afraid of? Of someone I respect seeing work that I found embarrassing, maybe. Of being exposed as a fraud, as if, because I once filled entire notebooks with \u201cfree verse\u201d poems about underage sex and drinking, I could never be considered a serious writer. Of someone thinking\u2014proving\u2014that I\u2019m not good enough. <!--more--><\/p>\n<p>I began my latest notebook on June 27, two days before I left with my husband and his family for Sedona. I wrote the first entry immediately and then forced myself to write in the notebook every single day after that, with a few exceptions. At this point, it\u2019s already almost half full. The entries consist of everything from daily summaries, or reflections on certain events, to dreams I had after reading Georges Perec\u2019s dream diary, <i>La Boutique Obscure<\/i>, to notes on how to edit my novel, to lists of words, phone numbers, and book titles, and notes taken while talking with friends. In the last case, I leave off trying to write down the most important parts and just write down whatever I hear. These entries read something like:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&#8211;\u00a0Empathizing with another entity or film<br \/> &#8211;\u00a0Literature is something you take whereas music and film are given to you<br \/> &#8211;\u00a0The act of reading is an exercise<br \/> &#8211;\u00a0Book: putting together elements of diction, semantics<br \/> &#8211; Film should just be presented to you<br \/> &#8211;\u00a0Technicality of film is meant to be seamless for the viewer<br \/> &#8211; The more technical literature is<br \/> &#8211;\u00a0A three-act film is just a three-act film<br \/> &#8211;\u00a0Started looking at film as a wholly technical thing<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>The process becomes an appropriation of language rather than an effort to make sense. At some point, I had to work through the idea that there would always be holes in the story of this notebook; that I could never collect everything that happened, and that furthermore, that wasn\u2019t at all the point. Learning to love and accept what doesn\u2019t make its way into my notebook is a matter of making peace with the physical limitations of writing. An earlier conversation with my husband and two of our friends while driving in Los Angeles, the first of its kind in the notebook, includes a brief interjection by me:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>Is that the gay Mexican club<br \/> I miss this place very much<br \/> What can I arrange with all these sounds<br \/> Find their own phrasing<br \/> Find their own rhythm<br \/> A semblance, rejoining<br \/> What the fuck is that, holy Jesus Christ<br \/> \u2026<br \/> There will always be holes between them<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>This was two days before I accidentally deleted all of the pictures I had taken thus far on the trip, which itself occurred the day before we were to fly back to New York. Of course, I was devastated. But I realized quickly that not all was lost, that I could use the notebook creatively to salvage some of the memories I feared I would lose along with the pictures. I started writing down one-line descriptions of as many pictures as I could remember. At some point, I realized it was easier to say \u201cSeveral taken down into the Grand Canyon\u201d rather than describe each picture in detail. And this is good enough for the purpose, because all that I need, when I look back over those entries, is the spark of a memory to set the whole scene in motion again.<\/p>\n<p>The impulse reminds me of a French writer I wrote about recently, Marie Chaix, whose novel <i>The Summer of the Elder Tree<\/i> was released by Dalkey Archive Press in June. It\u2019s the product of Chaix\u2019s weaving together notebooks she kept over the ten years she \u201cwasn\u2019t writing,\u201d following the death of her editor. There are gaps between events, sometimes lasting several months, but Chaix cinches together entries and then novelizes the in-between. Where the story doesn\u2019t follow linearly (and it really never does), she manifests a relationship between entries with the use of metaphor or anecdote, or by drawing a conclusion before moving on to the next challenge.<\/p>\n<p>I\u2019ve spent the last few years thinking that I wasn\u2019t the kind of writer who kept a notebook; that, because I don\u2019t often journal in it, the book that I carried around every day and wrote in wasn\u2019t enough of a notebook to be able to wear the name. I\u2019m not sure what I called it, but it certainly wasn\u2019t allowed among the ranks of Sontag\u2019s, Kafka\u2019s, or D.\u2009H. Lawrence\u2019s bound companions. Of course, this is ludicrous; looking at the stack of books I pulled off the shelf just to write this essay, it\u2019s clear to me that the relationship I have with my notebooks isn\u2019t just strong, but lively. It happens in small and larger sizes, different colors and textures of paper, bindings and frequencies, styles and methods, to say nothing of the letters and pieces of mail art sent to friends, and notes scribbled in the margins of every book I read. In answer to the question of whether I prefer to write by hand or on a computer, then, evidence would suggest that it doesn\u2019t make a difference. Where I write is beside the point. As long as it happens, it can happen anywhere.<\/p>\n<p><em>Sarah Gerard is a writer and a bookseller. Her fiction, criticism, and personal essays have appeared in\u00a0the <\/em> New York Times<em>, the <\/em>Los Angeles Review of Books<em>, <\/em>BOMB<em>,\u00a0<\/em>Slice<em> magazine, and other publications. Her journalism has appeared in\u00a0the <\/em>Tampa Bay Times<em>.\u00a0She earned her MFA at the New School.<\/em><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Read part 1 here. People often ask me whether, as a writer, I prefer to write by hand or on a computer. Realistically, it depends on the kind of writing I\u2019m doing, but for a long time I responded that I preferred writing on a computer because it\u2019s more difficult to write by hand and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":486,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[4393],"tags":[3357,8497,11718,75],"class_list":["post-58676","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-first-person","tag-diary","tag-marie-chaix","tag-notebooks","tag-writing"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"<!-- This site is optimized with the Yoast SEO Premium plugin v25.4 (Yoast SEO v25.4) - https:\/\/yoast.com\/wordpress\/plugins\/seo\/ -->\n<title>On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2 by Sarah Gerard<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"August 29, 2013 \u2013 Read part 1 here. People often ask me whether, as a writer, I prefer to write by hand or on a computer. Realistically, it depends on the kind of writing\" \/>\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\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:locale\" content=\"en_US\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:type\" content=\"article\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:title\" content=\"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2 by Sarah Gerard\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:description\" content=\"August 29, 2013 \u2013 Read part 1 here. People often ask me whether, as a writer, I prefer to write by hand or on a computer. Realistically, it depends on the kind of writing\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:url\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:site_name\" content=\"The Paris Review\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:publisher\" content=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\" \/>\n<meta property=\"article:published_time\" content=\"2013-08-29T16:00:36+00:00\" \/>\n<meta property=\"og:image\" content=\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:width\" content=\"600\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:height\" content=\"748\" \/>\n\t<meta property=\"og:image:type\" content=\"image\/jpeg\" \/>\n<meta name=\"author\" content=\"Sarah Gerard\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:card\" content=\"summary_large_image\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:creator\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:site\" content=\"@parisreview\" \/>\n<meta name=\"twitter:label1\" content=\"Written by\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data1\" content=\"Sarah Gerard\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:label2\" content=\"Est. reading time\" \/>\n\t<meta name=\"twitter:data2\" content=\"6 minutes\" \/>\n<script type=\"application\/ld+json\" class=\"yoast-schema-graph\">{\"@context\":\"https:\/\/schema.org\",\"@graph\":[{\"@type\":\"Article\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#article\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/\"},\"author\":{\"name\":\"Sarah Gerard\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/648ef6f727a9d9dea6baf35d16cfcc13\"},\"headline\":\"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2\",\"datePublished\":\"2013-08-29T16:00:36+00:00\",\"mainEntityOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/\"},\"wordCount\":1231,\"commentCount\":10,\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg\",\"keywords\":[\"diary\",\"Marie Chaix\",\"notebooks\",\"writing\"],\"articleSection\":[\"First Person\"],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"CommentAction\",\"name\":\"Comment\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#respond\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"WebPage\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/\",\"name\":\"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2 by Sarah Gerard\",\"isPartOf\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\"},\"primaryImageOfPage\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#primaryimage\"},\"thumbnailUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg\",\"datePublished\":\"2013-08-29T16:00:36+00:00\",\"description\":\"August 29, 2013 \u2013 Read part 1 here. People often ask me whether, as a writer, I prefer to write by hand or on a computer. Realistically, it depends on the kind of writing\",\"breadcrumb\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#breadcrumb\"},\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"ReadAction\",\"target\":[\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/\"]}]},{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#primaryimage\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg\"},{\"@type\":\"BreadcrumbList\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#breadcrumb\",\"itemListElement\":[{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":1,\"name\":\"Home\",\"item\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\"},{\"@type\":\"ListItem\",\"position\":2,\"name\":\"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2\"}]},{\"@type\":\"WebSite\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"description\":\"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. Since 1953.\",\"publisher\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\"},\"potentialAction\":[{\"@type\":\"SearchAction\",\"target\":{\"@type\":\"EntryPoint\",\"urlTemplate\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}\"},\"query-input\":{\"@type\":\"PropertyValueSpecification\",\"valueRequired\":true,\"valueName\":\"search_term_string\"}}],\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\"},{\"@type\":\"Organization\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization\",\"name\":\"The Paris Review\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/\",\"logo\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png\",\"width\":696,\"height\":696,\"caption\":\"The Paris Review\"},\"image\":{\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/\"},\"sameAs\":[\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/\",\"https:\/\/x.com\/parisreview\",\"https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/parisreview\"]},{\"@type\":\"Person\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/648ef6f727a9d9dea6baf35d16cfcc13\",\"name\":\"Sarah Gerard\",\"image\":{\"@type\":\"ImageObject\",\"inLanguage\":\"en-US\",\"@id\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/\",\"url\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/721161c6fdaead5dabe9f14bc606090ed24b25dc1919695fc78bea102181ee5a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"contentUrl\":\"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/721161c6fdaead5dabe9f14bc606090ed24b25dc1919695fc78bea102181ee5a?s=96&d=mm&r=g\",\"caption\":\"Sarah Gerard\"},\"url\":\"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/author\/sgerard\/\"}]}<\/script>\n<!-- \/ Yoast SEO Premium plugin. -->","yoast_head_json":{"title":"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2 by Sarah Gerard","description":"August 29, 2013 \u2013 Read part 1 here. People often ask me whether, as a writer, I prefer to write by hand or on a computer. Realistically, it depends on the kind of writing","robots":{"index":"index","follow":"follow","max-snippet":"max-snippet:-1","max-image-preview":"max-image-preview:large","max-video-preview":"max-video-preview:-1"},"canonical":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/","og_locale":"en_US","og_type":"article","og_title":"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2 by Sarah Gerard","og_description":"August 29, 2013 \u2013 Read part 1 here. People often ask me whether, as a writer, I prefer to write by hand or on a computer. Realistically, it depends on the kind of writing","og_url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/","og_site_name":"The Paris Review","article_publisher":"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/","article_published_time":"2013-08-29T16:00:36+00:00","og_image":[{"width":600,"height":748,"url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg","type":"image\/jpeg"}],"author":"Sarah Gerard","twitter_card":"summary_large_image","twitter_creator":"@parisreview","twitter_site":"@parisreview","twitter_misc":{"Written by":"Sarah Gerard","Est. reading time":"6 minutes"},"schema":{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Article","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#article","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/"},"author":{"name":"Sarah Gerard","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/648ef6f727a9d9dea6baf35d16cfcc13"},"headline":"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2","datePublished":"2013-08-29T16:00:36+00:00","mainEntityOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/"},"wordCount":1231,"commentCount":10,"publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg","keywords":["diary","Marie Chaix","notebooks","writing"],"articleSection":["First Person"],"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"CommentAction","name":"Comment","target":["https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#respond"]}]},{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/","name":"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2 by Sarah Gerard","isPartOf":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website"},"primaryImageOfPage":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#primaryimage"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#primaryimage"},"thumbnailUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg","datePublished":"2013-08-29T16:00:36+00:00","description":"August 29, 2013 \u2013 Read part 1 here. People often ask me whether, as a writer, I prefer to write by hand or on a computer. Realistically, it depends on the kind of writing","breadcrumb":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#breadcrumb"},"inLanguage":"en-US","potentialAction":[{"@type":"ReadAction","target":["https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/"]}]},{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#primaryimage","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/08\/SARAH_JOURNALlarge.jpg"},{"@type":"BreadcrumbList","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/2013\/08\/29\/on-keeping-a-notebook-part-2\/#breadcrumb","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"On Keeping a Notebook, Part 2"}]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#website","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/","name":"The Paris Review","description":"The best prose, interviews, poetry, and art. Since 1953.","publisher":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization"},"potentialAction":[{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/?s={search_term_string}"},"query-input":{"@type":"PropertyValueSpecification","valueRequired":true,"valueName":"search_term_string"}}],"inLanguage":"en-US"},{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#organization","name":"The Paris Review","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png","contentUrl":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/04\/tpr-hadada-roundell-logo-square.png","width":696,"height":696,"caption":"The Paris Review"},"image":{"@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/logo\/image\/"},"sameAs":["https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/parisreview\/","https:\/\/x.com\/parisreview","https:\/\/www.instagram.com\/parisreview"]},{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/648ef6f727a9d9dea6baf35d16cfcc13","name":"Sarah Gerard","image":{"@type":"ImageObject","inLanguage":"en-US","@id":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/#\/schema\/person\/image\/","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/721161c6fdaead5dabe9f14bc606090ed24b25dc1919695fc78bea102181ee5a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","contentUrl":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/721161c6fdaead5dabe9f14bc606090ed24b25dc1919695fc78bea102181ee5a?s=96&d=mm&r=g","caption":"Sarah Gerard"},"url":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/author\/sgerard\/"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58676","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/486"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=58676"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58676\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":58683,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/58676\/revisions\/58683"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=58676"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=58676"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theparisreview.org\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=58676"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}