Funny Because it’s True
How to Become a Writer by Lorrie Moore
“First, try to be something, anything, else. A movie star/astronaut. A movie star missionary. A movie star/kindergarten teacher. President of the World. Fail miserably. It is best if you fail at an early age — say, fourteen. Early, critical disillusionment is necessary so that at fifteen you can write long haiku sequences about thwarted desire.”
via R-KV-R-Y a Quarterly Literary Journal & Instapaper
Also: an interview with Lorrie Moore in The Believer
Required Reading.
The Poetics of Aristotle, by Aristotle.
“The Plot, then, is the first principle, and, as it were, the soul of a tragedy: Character holds the second place. A similar fact is seen in painting. The most beautiful colours, laid on confusedly, will not give as much pleasure as the chalk outline of a portrait. Thus Tragedy is the imitation of an action, and of the agents mainly with a view to the action.”
Trust in Twain
How to Tell a Story — Mark Twain
“I do not claim that I can tell a story as it ought to be told. I only claim to know how a story ought to be told, for I have been almost daily in the company of the most expert story-tellers for many years.”
WritingDay.com 