Uncategorized | April 20, 2004

I really like a recent blog post by Charlie titled Listening Online. It included links to virtual places to visit and hear poetry read. I very much like having work read to me– poetry, fiction, nonfiction– which is the primary reason I attend readings (the secondary reason being to support other writers). A friend and I were talking recently about why readings exist: it was clear to him why poetry readings exist, that aural power Charlie speaks of, the oral history of verse. But fiction, he said, does not have the same oral roots, which I argued was not true. We settled on this: that there were many starts to fiction and there are now many fiction lines. In my head I picture a chart, like those rolled up above chalkboards and used in science classes. On my chart there’s a layered cross-section of earth with what looks like a root system cutting down through it. And then, rising up from the thin top layer of green are many little sprouts– different plants. What looks on the chart like one root system is in fact many root systems, sprouting fictions of different sorts. But really all I was trying to say here is that I like having work read to me, no matter the genre. I like even to hear interviews about writing. And so here’s a link to something, a conversation between Francine Prose and Lydia Davis that includes snippets of sound along the way. Little gift packages of voices.