Although I missed the initial salvo of reports about the short story panel at PEN World Voices Festival, it’s worth checking out this summary from Stingy Kids, (and also Chekhov’s Mistress) to find out:
– the pro-short-story state of Korea and how that’s changing to encourage novels instead
– how an unrecognized Annie Proulx rose from the audience to deliver a monologue
– Editor of the Paris Review, Radhika Jones, receives 1200 short story submissions a month (and publishes one at most? You do the math)
– Israeli writer Etgar Keret on how short stories should be vomit-y rather than neat and clean
Two out of the three top recommendations by the NBCC in its Good Reads are short story collections, and while Jhumpa Lahiri has been getting tons of press, I think “Dangerous Laughter” by Steven Millhauser should be getting more attention.
Literary Rejections On Display has pics of rejection letters (ah, schadenfreude! Or does a handwritten letter from the New Yorker actually provoke envy?) Also, in regards to the Virginia Quarterly Review editor Ten Genoways challenging preconceived notions at LROD, Rhian Ellis over at Ward Six has read all six VQR stories and has found a common thread. This is what I love about the blogosphere: when a conversation spills out into adjacent blogs and the comment section goes crazy and everyone just starts talking (and arguing). There’s something beautiful about that.
