Tayari's Blog: The Yucky Factor

Posted by TayariJones on September 30, 2007 02:11 PM
Filed under Writing

Stephen King is the editor for the newest edition of Best American Short Stories. If you are not an MFA graduate, you probably don't even know that this series exists, let alone that an inclusion in the yearly collection is resume gold for a young writer trying to find an academic job.

In this NYT essay, King talks about his experience looking for the years best stories. I had to chuckle since one of my favorite games is looking for connections between the editor and the contributors. (I have found the geography is a huge factor.) Anyway, King talks about literally searching on his knees for little literary magazines. (I love the image.)

King also makes this excellent point:

What’s not so good is that writers write for whatever audience is left. In too many cases, that audience happens to consist of other writers and would-be writers who are reading the various literary magazines (and The New Yorker, of course, the holy grail of the young fiction writer) not to be entertained but to get an idea of what sells there. And this kind of reading isn’t real reading, the kind where you just can’t wait to find out what happens next (think “Youth,” by Joseph Conrad, or “Big Blonde,” by Dorothy Parker). It’s more like copping-a-feel reading. There’s something yucky about it.

Yeah, yucky, indeed.

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There are 1 comments on "The Yucky Factor". If you'd like to leave a comment, click here to jump down to the comments entry form.

Comment #1, by Debra [TypeKey Profile Page]

There is nothing better than to curl up on a Sunday with a good book, however, I imagine that I am in the minority these days even thinking this. I must say, I've often wondered who is still reading. Especially when I hear statistics such as the average American didn't read a single book last year. Yucky and terribly, terribly sad. - Debra

October 7, 2007 03:28 PM

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