I really like this from One Story’s interview with Tom Paine…
One Story: What is the best bit of advice about writing you have ever received?
I have a new short story that was recently published by the Kenyon Review Online.
There’s also audio of me reading the story, if you dare.
The sun slips into the blank sky, asserting itself like a flame sparking to life, just as the bus climbs and then descends a hill, also revealing the city spread out below. It’s a beautiful thing, coming upon this sight in such a dramatic fashion. She is either half-awake or half-asleep. But there is definitely some level of consciousness, an understanding of the moment. The bus driver gasses it to ensure they cross the next intersection in time. And they do, they beat the yellow, barreling forward. And it’s as if they’re heading straight for the light ahead and nothing will stop them. The driver is drinking coffee from a giant Thermos. The same driver who was eating the sandwich last night. Now chugging the caffeine with one hand and navigating the steering wheel with the other. How much longer before they change shifts and it’s another driver? Then he slows it down, breaking the spell of speed and momentum, and pulls over at the next stop. People are waiting there. He opens the door, and she watches the passengers silently board, the bus resumes its journey, the sunlight continues to color the sky, the day begins, and there is no other way.
Last Monday I woke up with a feeling. A writerly feeling. It’s a feeling I get from time to time.
The feeling was this: I’m going to get some good writing-related news today.
Now, usually (that is, 99.9 percent of the time) the feeling doesn’t equate to something actually happening. The feeling and the day passes.
But on this particular Monday, I got a phone call from Glimmer Train in the afternoon. The magazine accepted my short story “A Matter of Twenty-Four Hours” (a story, by the way, that had been rejected by multiple magazines).
Then, on Friday, I wrapped up the final edits for BELIEVERS. And damn, that felt good.
A good week indeed.
When you read the sentences of a writer like Colum McCann, you can’t help but wonder: How does he do it? Does he get into some kind of trance-like state to conjure such sustained, such devastating beauty? You wonder: What does it take to be able to achieve that? How does one apprentice his/her way to this level of clarity and vision and generosity?
(I’m currently reading McCann’s novel This Side of Brightness.)
