He got up and sat on the edge of the bedstead with his back to the window. “It’s better not to sleep at all,” he decided. There was a cold damp draught from the window, however; without getting up he drew the blanket over him and wrapped himself in it. He was not thinking of anything and did not want to think. But one image rose after another, incoherent scraps of thought without beginning or end passed through his mind. He sank into drowsiness. Perhaps the cold, or the dampness, or the dark, or the wind that howled under the window and tossed the trees roused a sort of persistent craving for the fantastic. He kept dwelling on images of flowers, he fancied a charming flower garden, a bright, warm, almost hot day, a holiday—Trinity day. A fine, sumptuous country cottage in the English taste overgrown with fragrant flowers, with flower beds going round the house; the porch, wreathed in climbers, was surrounded with beds of roses. A light, cool staircase, carpeted with rich rugs, was decorated with rare plants in china pots. He noticed particularly in the windows nosegays of tender, white, heavily fragrant narcissus bending over their bright, green, thick long stalks. He was reluctant to move away from them, but he went up the stairs and came into a large, high drawing-room and again everywhere—at the windows, the doors on to the balcony, and on the balcony itself—were flowers. The floors were strewn with freshly-cut fragrant hay, the windows were open, a fresh, cool, light air came into the room. The birds were chirruping under the window, and in the middle of the room, on a table covered with a white satin shroud, stood a coffin. The coffin was covered with white silk and edged with a thick white frill; wreaths of flowers surrounded it on all sides. Among the flowers lay a girl in a white muslin dress, with her arms crossed and pressed on her bosom, as though carved out of marble. But her loose fair hair was wet; there was a wreath of roses on her head. The stern and already rigid profile of her face looked as though chiselled of marble too, and the smile on her pale lips was full of an immense unchildish misery and sorrowful appeal. Svidrigaïlov knew that girl; there was no holy image, no burning candle beside the coffin; no sound of prayers: the girl had drowned herself. She was only fourteen, but her heart was broken. And she had destroyed herself, crushed by an insult that had appalled and amazed that childish soul, had smirched that angel purity with unmerited disgrace and torn from her a last scream of despair, unheeded and brutally disregarded, on a dark night in the cold and wet while the wind howled
The Blog
Late Blooming Writers 
Emma Straub on late blooming writers: The other glorious, inspiring truth is that some people are naturally late bloomers. Leonard Cohen didn’t release his first album until he was 32. Julia Child didn’t move to Paris until she was 36, and she didn’t get her famous television show until she was 51. Wallace Stevens didn’t publish any poems until he was […]
Read More Bad Book Covers The venerable Atlantic offered a list of the best 25 book covers of the year. Exclusively for your viewing pleasure, I’ve pulled together some of the worst book covers. Enjoy. 1. Police cars in space? That’s killer national security. 2. This cover definitely makes me want to buy. 3. Want to learn how to publish […]
Read More Duotrope Moves to Paid Subscriptions; Writers Respond with Violent Protests Cheap, neurotic writers throughout the globe took to the streets on Friday night to protest austerity measures at Duotrope, the website that catalogues fiction markets. Spurred by the news that Duotrope was going to wall off its fiction listings to paid subscribers only, writers protested in the way that only writers can — a few […]
Read More Antoine Wilson Interview Antoine Wilson, author of the newly released novel Panorama City, was gracious enough to answer interview questions via email for BookFox. Wilson’s previous novel “The Interloper” was fantastic, and he is a sterling member of the Los Angeles literary community, in addition to being a really nice guy (at least at the literary parties where […]
Read More Salman Rushdie’s Advice for Writers In Salman Rushdie’s memoir Joseph Anton, he talks a lot about his writing process, and how he learned to write while under the fatwa. Below are snippets of advice gleaned from the book, and remember that this was written in the third person, so when there is a “he” or “Joseph Anton,” that refers to […]
Read More Marilynne Robinson’s Pedagogy Marilynne Robinson on how she teaches her students: “I try to make writers actually see what they have written, where the strength is. Usually in fiction there’s something that leaps out—an image or a moment that is strong enough to center the story. If they can see it, they can exploit it, enhance it, and […]
Read More Writers Are Terrible Monsters Colm Toibin on writers: “You have to be a terrible monster to write. Someone might have told you something they shouldn’t have told you, and you have to be prepared to use it because it will make a great story. You have to use it even though the person is identifiable. If you can’t do […]
Read More David Foster Wallace Postcard David Foster Wallace wrote a postcard to a fan, and the fan writes about moving from initial disappointment to a gradual realization of what Wallace was trying to say. Yes, even DFW postcards can be deep: “[David Foster Wallace] was telling me what I already knew but had forgotten over the long years of struggling for […]
Read More The First Chapter’s Last Line Jonathan Franzen was wrong about many things. About Oprah’s book club. About the value of Twitter. About the quality of Freedom. But he was not wrong about Paula Fox. Franzen championed Fox (no relation to your proprietor) early in his career, before he published The Corrections, talking her up in essays in Harper’s and writing […]
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